jtibrarjp  of  "the  t1veolo;gical 

PRINCETON  •  NEW  JERSEY 

PRESENTED  BY 

John  Stuart  Conning,  D.D. 

DS  135  .R9  D38  1903 
Davitt,  Michael,  1846-1906. 
Within  the  pale 


tXs 

n:-  A*'  • 


' 


\ 


WITHIN  THE 


V 

\ 


PALE 


JAD  ^ 

WITHIN^ 
THE  PALE 

The  True  Story  of  Anti-Semitic 
P ersecution  in  Russia 


BY 

MICHAEL  DAVITT 

AUTHOR  OF  ''  LEAVES  FROM  A  PRISON  DIARY,” 
“  LIFE  AND  PROGRESS  IN  AUSTRALASIA,” 
“the  BOER  FIGHT  FOR 
FREEDOM,”  ETC. 

SPECIAL  EDITION 


IpbtlaDelpbla 

THE  JEWISH  PUBLICATION 
SOCIETY  OF  AMERICA 

NEW  YORK 


A.  S.  BARNES  &  CO. 
1903 


Copyright,  1903, 

By  a.  S.  BARNES  &  CO., 


Published,  October, 


PREFACE 


It  is  deemed  necessary,  for  the  twofold 
aim  of  this  book, — to  arouse  public  feeling 
against  a  murder-making  legend,  and  to  put 
forward  a  plea  for  the  objects  of  the  Zionist 
movement, — to  tell  the  story  of  the  Russian 
Jew,  apropos  of  recent  massacres.  This 
task  could  only  be  partially  done  in  my  des¬ 
patches  from  Kishineff  to  Mr.  William  R. 
Hearst’s  American  papers.  Moreover,  all 
the  despatches  were  not  published,  for  rea¬ 
sons  which  govern  the  exigencies  of  jour¬ 
nals  that  are  concerned  much  more  with  a 
record  of  daily  events  in  the  United  States 
than  with  history. 

While  in  Russia  I  tried  to  find  both  sides 
of  the  anti-Semitic  Question,  so  as  to  give 
expression  to  all  views  which  could  throw 
light  upon  crimes  that  had  shocked  the  pub¬ 
lic  mind  in  America  and  in  Europe  no  more 


V 


VI 


PREFACE 


than  they  had  pained  and  scandalised  all 
right-thinking  Russians. 

To  several  of  the  minor  representatives  of 
the  Tsar’s  Government  I  owe  an  acknowl¬ 
edgment  for  uniform  courtesies,  and  for 
valuable  assistance  in  my  investigations, 
and  I  endeavour,  in  the  chapter  on  Rus¬ 
sia’s  Attitude,”  to  let  the  voice  of  such  ex¬ 
ponents  of  official  Russian  ideas  and  pur¬ 
poses  be  heard  alongside  of  counter  Jewish 
accusations. 

The  unwarranted  attempts  that  have  been 
made  in  some  quarters  to  use  the  Kishinev 
crimes  as  means  of  creating  an  unfriendly 
feeling  between  the  two  greatest  powers  in 
the  world  to-day — the  United  States  Re¬ 
public  and  the  Empire  of  Russia — ^are  repre¬ 
hensible.  There  are  very  unworthy  motives 
behind  this  mischievous  endeavour  that  are 
not  calculated  to  serve  the  cause  of  the  Rus¬ 
sian  Jew.  The  writer  of  these  pages  can 
have  no  sympathy  with  nor  lend  encourage¬ 
ment  of  any  kind  to  these  sinister  efforts. 

Russia  cannot,  for  her  own  sake,  allow  the 


PKEFACE  vii 

present  state  of  things  to  continue  within 
the  Pale  of  Settlement,  lleform  or  revolu¬ 
tion  must  deal  with  an  absolutely  impos¬ 
sible  condition  of  social  and  economic  life. 

I  follow  Russian,  and  not  Jewish,  guid¬ 
ance  in  the  brief  sketch  I  give  of  the  history 
of  the  Russian  Jew  and  of  his  long  and 
persistent  persecution.  The  clear  and  un¬ 
biassed  opinions,  and  statement  of  historic 
facts,  so  courageously  and  clearly  expressed 
in  Prince  Demidoff  San  Donators  book,  have 
been  the  chief  source  of  information  from 
which  the  materials  for  that  sketch  have 
been  derived. 

The  Jew,  as  he  is  ruled  and  oppressed  by 
Russian  officials,  is  a  far  greater  danger  to 
Russian  autocracy  than  anti-Semitism  is 
to  the  Israelites  of  the  Pale.  The  danger 
was  candidly  avowed  by  all  representative 
Russians  from  whom  I  solicited  light  and 
information.  The  average  Russian,  how¬ 
ever,  errs  most  seriously  in  believing  that 
measures  of  repression,  like  those  of  1882 
and  1891,  can  ever  cure  the  Empire  of  its 


PREFACE 


•  •  • 

Till 

“  Semitic  malady/’  as  one  high  official 
harshly  expressed  it.  Had  far  more  drastic 
and  more  barbarous  methods  of  coercion 
than  those  of  General  Ignatieff  possessed 
the  power  to  cure  a  similar  malady/’  or 
kill  the  same  race,  no  Jew  would  be  alive  on 
earth  to-day  to  trouble  the  domestic  cares  of 
the  Tsar’s  Government.  There  can  be  no 
stronger  argument  against  the  policy  of 
continued  repression  found  in  the  literature 
or  history  of  liberty  than  the  existence  and 
the  marvellous  influence  to-day  of  this,  the 
most  persecuted  of  all  peoples  among  the 
civilised  races. 

Contempt  for  human  rights,  even  if  they 
be  Jewish  rights,  is  an  unwise  attitude  for 
an  autocratic  government.  It  can  only  lead 
to  more  outrage,  through  the  example  and 
encouragement  it  offers  to  the  lowest  aims 
of  anti-Semitism;  to  more  poverty,  through 
the  steady  increase  within  the  existing  Pale 
of  men  and  women  of  the  most  intellectual 
of  races,  who  grow  up  conscious  of  the  fact 
that  they  are  made  poor  by  the  working  of 


PREFACE 


IX 


special  laws,  because  they  are  Hebrews. 
Such  contempt  and  neglect  are  the  best  re¬ 
cruiting  forces  for  disloyalty  and  Socialism 
among  4,000,000  subjects,  having  powerful 
racial  friends  and  political  allies  in  coun¬ 
tries  where  Russia's  strongest  enemies  are 
to  be  found ;  and  are  far  more  dangerous  to 
Russia's  internal  peace  and  progress  than 
any  measure  of  Jewish  emancipation  could 

possibly  be. 

This  book  is  neither  inspired  by  feeling, 
political  or  otherwise,  against  Russia,  nor 
by  any  pro- Jewish  purpose  outside  the  ques¬ 
tions  immediately  touched  upon  by  the  wri¬ 
ter.  Where  anti-Semitism  stands,  in  fair 
political  combat,  in  opposition  to  the  foes  of 
nationality,  or  against  the  engineers  of  a 
sordid  war  in  South  Africa,  or  as  the  assail¬ 
ant  of  the  economic  evils  of  unscrupulous 
capitalism  anywhere,  I  am  resolutely  in 
line  with  its  spirit  and  programme.  Where, 
however,  it  only  speaks  and  acts  in  a  cow¬ 
ardly  racial  warfare,  which  descends  to  the 
use  of  an  atrocious  fabrication  responsible 


X 


PREFACE 


for  odious  and  unspeakable  crimes  like  those 
that  are  to  its  credit  in  the  massacres  of 
Kishineff,  it  becomes  a  thing  deserving  of 
no  more  toleration  from  right-minded  men 
than  do  the  germs  of  some  malady  laden 
with  the  poison  of  a  malignant  disease. 

The  inquiries  made  by  me  in  Kishineff 
convince  me  that  the  peculiar  atrocity  of 
most  of  the  crimes  perpetrated  against  the 
Jews  of  the  city  at  Easter  were  directly  at¬ 
tributable  to  the  horrible  influence  of  the 
ritual-murder  propaganda  upon  untutored 
minds  possessed  of  an  ignorant  and  fanati¬ 
cal  conception  of  religion. 

Should  these  pages  succeed,  even  to  a  lit¬ 
tle  extent,  in  influencing  public  feeling  in 
America  and  Europe,  in  favour  of  the  sug¬ 
gestions  they  contain  for  the  redress  of  the 
indefensible  wrongs  of  a  long-suffering  peo¬ 
ple,  the  writer  will  be  amply  rewarded  for 
his  small  share  in  the  performance  of  so 
worthy  and  necessary  a  task. 

The  public  moral  sense  of  all  nations,’^ 
wrote  Cardinal  Manning,  on  the  same  topic, 


PREFACE 


xi 


a  dozen  years  ago,  “  is  created  and  sus¬ 
tained  by  participation  in  a  universal  com¬ 
mon  law ;  when  this  is  anywhere  broken,  or 
wounded,  it  is  not  only  sympathy,  but  civi¬ 
lisation,  that  has  the  privilege  of  respectful 
remonstrance.”  _  M.  D. 

St.  Justins,  Dalket,  Ireland, 
m  July,  1903. 


CONTENTS 


PART  I 

The  Story  of  the  Russian  Jew 

CHAPTER  PAGE 


I.  From  Ancient  Times  to  1804,  .  .  .  1 

II.  The  Pale  op  Settlement  (1804-1882),  .  12 

III.  From  the  Ignatiepp  Laws  to  the  Kishi- 


IV. 

NEFP  Massacres,  .  .  . 

A  Murder-Making  Legend, 

.  83 

.  52 

V. 

Russia’s  Attitude,  .... 

.  64 

VI. 

The  Zionist  Solution, 

CO 

• 

PART  II 

The  Kishinefp  Massacres 

VIL 

I. 

Origin  and  Agency,  .... 

91 

VIII. 

II. 

Letters  from  Kishinefp,  . 

101 

IX. 

III. 

M.  DE  Plehve’s  Version,  . 

182 

X. 

IV. 

An  Impartial  Account, 

189 

XI. 

V. 

Documents : 

(I)  Petition  to  the  Director- 
General  OF  Police,  . 

207 

(II)  List  op  Killed, 

217 

(III)  Extracts  from  a  Report  by 
Two  Christian  Ladies, 

222 

XII. 

Notes  and  Comments, . 

231 

xill 


xiv  CONTENTS 

APPENDICES 

I.  PREsroENT  Roosevelt  on  the  Kishinepp 
Crime  and  the  Jews,  .  .  .  . 

II.  Letter  prom  Tolstoy,  .... 

III.  Letter  prom  Maxime  Gorky, 

IV.  Father  John  op  Kronstadt  Recants, 

V.  The  Story  op  Simon  op  Trent, 

VI.  English  Translation  op  Papal  Bulls, 


PAGB 

256 

268 

272 

276 

278 

291 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


PART  I 

TEE  STORY  OF  TEE  RUSSIAN  JEW 

CHAPTER  I 

FROM  ANCIENT  TIMES  TO  1804 
HE  time  when  Jews  first  settled  in 


Russia  is  a  subject  of  mere  historical 
conjecture.  Some  accounts  assert  that  col¬ 
onies  of  the  race  were  founded  in  the  coun¬ 
try  bordering  on  the  Black  Sea  several  cen¬ 
turies  before  the  Christian  era.  All  the 
probabilities  favour  this  view.  Both  before 
and  after  their  dispersion  by  the  Romans,  a 
people  so  intelligent  and  resourceful  as  the 
Hebrews  would  learn  of  the  fruitful  regions 
watered  by  the  four  great  rivers  which  flow 
into  the  southern  sea-boundaries  of  the  vast 
territory  now  under  the  sway  of  the  Tsar. 


2 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


They  would  have  a  choice  of  land  and  sea 
routes  for  the  voyages  of  emigration,  trade, 
or  adventure. 

The  distance  from  Jerusalem  to  the 
mouth  of  the  Volga,  through  Asia  Minor 
and  the  Caucasus,  is  not  much  more  than 
from  Astrakhan  to  St.  Petersburg,  while 
the  journey  by  sea  from  Joppa  to  where  the 
city  of  Odessa  stands  to-day  for  Russians 
richest  seaport,  is  much  less  than  that  from 
Athens  to  Marseilles.  The  Caucasus,  Tau¬ 
rida  (Crimea),  Cherson,  and  Bessarabia, 
known  in  the  days  of  King  Solomon  by  other 
names,  would  be  within  the  zone  of  trading 
intercourse  with  the  Kingdom  of  Israel, 
while  these  rich  and  interesting  parts  of 
Southern  Russia  would  naturally  attract 
the  footsteps  of  the  scattered  race  after 
Titus  had  destroyed  their  nation  and  dis¬ 
persed  its  people,  as  well  as  during  the 
existence  of  the  Byzantine  Empire. 

Whether  the  race  known  as  the  Khazars, 
who  governed  the  territory  stretching  north 
from  Astrakhan  over  the  eastern  watershed 


THE  RUSSIAN  JEW 


3 


of  the  Volga  as  far  as  Kazan,  were  civilised 
by  Semitic  colonists,  as  alleged  by  some  wri¬ 
ters,  is  now  only  an  interesting  speculation. 
One  fact  offered  in  support  of  this  theory 
is  that  the  Israelites  were  driven  out  of 
this  country  by  its  rulers  in  the  eleventh 
century,  at  a  time  when  Jews  in  Christian 
Europe  began  to  be  objects  of  race  persecu¬ 
tion. 

The  period  of  the  Crusades  may  be  taken 
as  that  in  which  the  systematic  oppression 
of  the  Jews  began.  The  source  of  this  perse¬ 
cution  was  the  religious  influence  upon  un¬ 
educated  minds  of  the  gospel  of  the  Cruci¬ 
fixion,  coupled  with  legends  about  ritual 
murders,  and  fables  recording  the  sacrifice 
of  the  blood  of  Christian  children  and 
maidens  during  the  sacred  rites  of  Paschal 
time. 

It  is  on  record  that,  in  the  year  1298,  a 
fanatic  in  a  city  of  Franconia  circulated  a 
story  that  the  Sacred  Host  in  a  church  had 
been  polluted  by  a  Jew,  and  that  the  Al¬ 
mighty  had  chosen  an  avenger  of  this  crime 


4 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


in  the  person  of  the  narrator  of  the  act  of 
sacrilege.  The  populace  rose  en  masse  and 
burned  all  the  Jews  in  the  city.  The  mas¬ 
sacre  extended  to  the  country,  and,  before 
the  murderous  fury  unchained  by  this  fan¬ 
atic  and  his  falsehood  could  be  stilled,  over 
100,000  victims  were  slaughtered  in  Ger¬ 
many,  Bavaria,  and  Austria. 

It  was  following  these  and  similar  feroci¬ 
ties  that  the  first  great  movement  of  the 
Semitic  race  into  Poland  occurred.  They 
were  encouraged  to  move  into  this  country 
by  the  toleration  extended  to  smaller  col¬ 
onies  of  their  race  who  had  settled  in  Polish 
dominions  in  earlier  times.  All  accounts 
agree  in  crediting  to  this  ancient  King¬ 
dom  a  far  more  enlightened  rule  of  the  pro¬ 
scribed  Israelites  than  to  any  other  Chris¬ 
tian  nation  during  the  Middle  Ages.  Casi- 
mir  the  Great  protected  them  in  both  their 
religious  and  civil  liberties,  in  return  for 
which  freedom  they  helped  to  organise  and 
develop  the  commerce  and  crafts  of  the 
'  country.  They  flourished  and  multiplied 


THE  RUSSIAN  JEW 


5 


under  such  rule,  and  became  the  trading 
link  between  producer  and  consumer,  in  the 
economic  life  of  Poland,  as  well  as  tillers  of 
the  soil  and  expert  artisans. 

It  is  an  error  to  assume  that  the  Jews 
have  not  thriven  anywhere  in  agricultural 
industry.  Wherever  they  were  sure  of 
protection  against  spoliation,  they  took  to 
land  labour  as  readily  as  to  other  pursuits, 
and  succeeded.  This  was  so  in  Poland  dur¬ 
ing  the  two  centuries  in  which  they  shared 
in  the  general  rights  guaranteed  by  the 
state.  Accounts  of  Jewish  agricultural  col¬ 
onies  in  various  parts  of  Russia,  in  later 
days,  also  support  the  same  testimony.  In 
fact  there  was  no  better  foundation  for  this 
charge  in  times  anterior  to  our  own  than  the 
circumstance  that  a  people  who  were  not 
permitted  to  own  land  anywhere,  or  even  to 
cultivate  it  in  some  countries,  were,  in  con¬ 
sequence,  subjected  to  the  imputation  of 
having  a  racial  prejudice  against  this  means 
of  obtaining  a  livelihood. 

The  halcyon  period  of  Jewish  freedom  in 


6 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


Poland  came  to  an  end  in  the  middle  of  the 
seventeenth  century.  That  proud  and  an¬ 
cient  nation  was  itself  the  victim  of  inva¬ 
sion  and  oppression,  and  its  Semitic  popu¬ 
lation  lost  over  200,000  men,  women,  and 
children  in  the  ferocious  campaigns  waged 
by  the  conquering  Cossack  Hetman,  and  his 
Tartar  and  Kussian  allies,  against  Poles 
and  Jews  alike. 

The  Jews  of  Poland  survived  this  calam¬ 
ity,  and  grew  numerous  again,  as  persecuted 
civilised  races  somehow  do,  in  their  own,  or 
in  some  other,  land.  They,  however,  lent 
assistance  to  the  designs  of  the  ambitious 
nobles  when  the  landed  aristocracy  invaded 
the  recognised  prerogatives  of  the  kingly 
power,  and  took  to  themselves  all  the  re¬ 
sponsibilities  and  advantages  of  govern¬ 
ment.  They  became  their  agents  and  in¬ 
struments  in  the  sordid  work  of  harassing 
the  peasant  cultivators,  who  found  them¬ 
selves  ground  down  more  remorselessly  by 
class  rule  than  under  a  semi-republican 
monarchy.  Popular  feeling  w^as  thus  turned 


THE  RUSSIAN  JEW 


7 


against  the  Jews,  and  they  began  to  experi¬ 
ence,  in  Poland,  as  elsewhere,  that  social 
and  economic  antipathy  which  their  greater 
money-making  capacity  has  always  nour- 
ished  in  the  commercial  minds  of  the  less 
successful  Christians. 

As  a  friend  of  Polish  freedom  remarked 
to  the  writer  in  Warsaw  in  the  spring  of 
1903,  the  nobles  cultivated  their  pride, 
rack-rented  their  tenants,  and  lost  their  in¬ 
dependence.”  And,  with  this  fall  of  the  one 
Christian  nation  in  Europe,  which  had 
fairly  ruled  and  humanely  treated  the 
hunted  Hebrew  up  to  the  eighteenth  cen¬ 
tury,  the  era  of  systematic  persecution  be¬ 
gan  for  the  Polish  Jew  when  a  cruel  fate 
compelled  him  to  become  a  Russian  subject. 

The  early  oppression  of  the  Jews  in 
Russia  was  entirely  due  to  religious  feeling. 
Their  exceptional  treatment  in  recent  years 
arises  from  political  and  economic  more 
than  from  sectarian  causes.  M.  Varadinoff, 
in  his  history  of  Russian  administration, 
says :  The  history  of  all  the  cases  since 


8 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


1649,  involving  Jewish  religious  matters, 
bears  on  it  the  stamp  of  mistrust  to  the 
followers  of  the  law  of  Moses,  because  the 
Jews,  by  their  false  doctrines,  convert  to 
their  faith  not  only  Christians,  but  persons 
belonging  to  other  religious  persuasions; 
in  consequence  of  this  the  civil  rights  of  the 
Jews  were  more  or  less  restricted,  and  their 
settlement  in  Russia  was  prohibited.  They 
were  also  on  several  occasions  entirely  ex¬ 
pelled  across  the  Russian  frontiers.  The 
code  of  Alexis  Mikailovitch  provides  punish¬ 
ment  of  death  for  the  perversion  of  a  Chris¬ 
tian  to  the  Hebrew  faith.  In  1676  Jews 
were  prohibited  from  coming  to  Moscow 
from  Smolensk,  and  in  1727  an  order  was 
promulgated  to  the  effect  that  ^  All  Jews 
found  to  be  residing  in  the  Ukraine  and  in 
Russian  towns  shall  be  immediately  ex¬ 
pelled  beyond  the  frontier,  and  not  be  al¬ 
lowed  under  any  circumstances  to  enter 
Russia.’  ” 

Prince  Demidoff  San  Donato,  in  quoting 
this  expert  in  his  excellent  book,  says  that  a 


THE  RUSSIAN  JEW 


9 


proviso  to  this  ukase  stipulated  that  before 
leaving  Russia  all  the  Jews  were  to  be  made 
to  exchange  their  gold  and  silver  for  copper 

money ! 

It  was  found  practically  impossible,  how¬ 
ever,  to  carry  out  decrees  of  complete  ex¬ 
pulsion,  while,  on  the  other  hand,  it  had  to 
be  recognised  thait  the  interest  of  the  state 
and  the  development  of  trade  required  the 
trained  experience  of  Hebrew  craftsmen, 
merchants,  and  bankers.  They  were  toler¬ 
ated  for  the  utilitarian  ends  of  commercial 
necessity,  while  being  subject  to  all  the 
possible  penalties  of  an  outlawed  com¬ 
munity. 

Nearing  the  end  of  the  eighteenth  century 
the  trend  of  Russian  conquest  westwards 
annexed  the  Polish  regions  known  as  White 
Russia,  and  the  Lithuanian  country,  in 
which  Jews  had  hitherto  found  shelter  when 
driven  out  from  Russia  proper.  Catherine 
II.  governed  the  Empire  at  this  period,  and 
her  somewhat  liberal  views  gave  her  Hebrew 
subjects  a  brief  respite  from  persistent  in- 


10 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


justice.  It  was  necessarj^  to  take  account 
of  the  recognised  status  of  the  Jews  in  what 
had  been  a  portion  of  the  Kingdom  of 
Poland,  and  a  ukase  was  promulgated  in 
1786,  decreeing  that  Everyone,  irrrespec- 
tive  of  creed,  shall  enjoy  under  the  laws  all 
the  advantages  and  privileges  of  his  rank 
and  condition/^  This  enlightened  law  only 
extended  to  the  territories  acquired  from 
Poland,  and  even  within  these  the  tolerant 
intention  of  the  ukase  was  frustrated  by 
the  bias  of  Russian  officials.  The  right  to 
enrol  themselves  in  burgher  guilds  was  cur¬ 
tailed,  while  double  taxes  were  levied  upon 
the  very  people  whom  the  law  of  1786  had, 
in  words,  freed  from  exceptional  burdens. 

Other  special  penalties  followed,  to  be 
again  mitigated  as  when,  in  1804,  a  ukase 
declared  that  a  spirit  of  moderation  and  a 
sincere  wish  for  the  amelioration  of  the  con¬ 
dition  of  the  J ews,’’  should  be  shown  as 
being  in  the  best  interest  of  the  population 
among  whom  the  Hebrews  were  allowed  to 
live.  This  temporary  return  to  reason  and 


THE  RUSSIAN  JEW 


11 


justice  was  also  due  to  the  desire  to  give 
Russian  workers  and  peasants  the  advan¬ 
tages  of  superior  Jewish  workmanship  in 
arts,  and  the  example  of  trading  com¬ 
petency.  Jewish  children  were  to  be  ad¬ 
mitted  to  Russian  schools.  Manufacturing 
industry  and  the  occupation  of  land  were 
to  be  thrown  open  to  Jews  hitherto  denied 
access  to  these  employments,  except  in 
specified  places. 

These,  however,  were  but  Russian  good 
intentions.  They  lacked  the  value  of  ap¬ 
plication. 


CHAPTEK  II 

THE  PAI,E  OF  SETTLEMENT  (18044882) 


Gradually  the  provinces  along  the 
western  frontier,  stretching  south 
from  Riga  to  the  territories  bordering  on 
the  Black  Sea,  became  marked  off  as  a 


Pale  of  Settlement.  Within  these  regions 
all  the  Jews  of  the  Empire  were  to  be  domi¬ 
ciled;  saving  merchants,  bankers,  scientists. 


and  eminent  Hebrews  whose  wealth  or  ac¬ 
complishments  would  outweigh  in  the  self¬ 
ish  plans  of  domestic  government  the  anti- 
Semitic  feeling  which  appealed  to  the  des¬ 
potic  expediency  of  exceptional  laws.  In¬ 
side  this  economic  Siberia,  the  poorer  Jews 
would  have  their  chances  of  employment 
greatly  diminished,  while  the  struggle  for 
existence  must  become  by  degrees  a  contest 
between  a  growing  population  and  a  nar¬ 
rower  area  of  industrial  opportunity. 


12 


THE  RUSSIAN  JEW 


13 


Unnatural  social  and  economic  conditions 
necessarily  engender  correlative  abuses  and 
evils.  Poverty,  illegal  pursuits,  the  smug¬ 
gling  and  sale  of  liquor,  evasion  of  coercive 
laws,  bribery  and  corruption,  protested 
against  the  causes  which  begot  them,  until 
finally  an  Imperial  Commission  had  to  be 
appointed  to  inquire  into  and  report  upon 
the  measures  necessary  to  remedy  this  state 
of  things.  This  Commission  issued  its  re¬ 
port  in  1812.  The  report  is  so  tersely  sum¬ 
marised  in  Prince  Demidoff^s  book,  and  the 
matters  dealt  with  are  so  intimately  con¬ 
nected  with  the  inherited  injustices  of  the 
Russian  Jew,  that  I  cannot  forbear  adding 
the  following  extract  to  this  brief  historic 
sketch  of  anti-Semitic  legislation  and  its 
results : 

Firstly,  the  Commission  was  of  opinion 
that  the  impossibility  of  carrying  out  the 
provisions  of  paragraph  34  of  the  Law  of 
1804  ^did  not  arise  from  the  obstinacy  of  the 
Jews  and  remissness  of  the  authorities,  but 
from  the  natural  and  political  condition  of 


14 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


those  provinces  to  which  residence  of  the 
Jews  is  restricted.^  The  report  then  states 
that  while  the  Jews  retained  their  political 
independence  and  lived  in  their  own  coun¬ 
try,  they  were  an  agricultural  people. 
Subsequently,  when  they  were  dispersed 
over  the  whole  world  and  everywhere  sub¬ 
jected  to  the  bitterest  persecution,  unrecog¬ 
nised  as  regular  citizens  of  the  countries  in 
which  they  were  domiciled,  agriculture  be¬ 
came  to  them  an  inaccessible  pursuit.  They 
were  thus  necessarily  obliged  to  have  re¬ 
course  to  trade  as  the  sole  means  of  occupa¬ 
tion  according  with  their  new  condition  of 
life. 

In  Poland  the  Jews  were  so  numerous 
that  the  pursuit  of  trade  alone  was  insuf¬ 
ficient  for  their  subsistence.  On  the  one 
hand,  the  Polish  landlords,  owing  to  con¬ 
stant  wars  and  internal  strife,  were  not  able 
to  manage  their  own  estates  in  a  proper 
manner.  They  were,  therefore,  obliged  to 
seek  special  means  for  increasing  the 
revenue  of  their  properties,  for  instance,  by 


THE  RUSSIAN  JEW 


15 


distilling  brandy,  lease  of  farms,  etc.  The 
correlation  of  these  two  causes  led  to  the 
utilisation  of  the  Jews  by  the  landed  pro¬ 
prietors  in  their  domestic  concerns.  The 
Jews  became  indispensable  to  the  landed 
proprietors,  and  as  they  did  not  possess  the 
right  to  acquire  land  and  engage  in  agricul¬ 
ture,  they  were  obliged,  while  residing  in 
villages,  to  confine  themselves  to  a  retail 
sale  of  spirits  as  a  main  pursuit. 

<<  When  White  Russia  was  annexed  to 
Russia,  the  Russian  Government  recognised 
all  the  previously  existing  rights  of  the 
Jews.  The  ukase  of  the  Senate  of  1786 
confirmed  their  right  of  residence  in  provin¬ 
cial  districts,  and  their  faculty  of  holding 
estates  on  lease.  The  immediate  object  of 
this  law  was  the  suppression  of  drunken¬ 
ness  among  the  rural  population.  The  dis¬ 
tillation  of  brandy,  however,  is  a  privilege 
of  all  landed  proprietors,  and  forms  a  neces¬ 
sary  adjunct  to  the  process  of  agriculture. 
With  the  departure  [expulsion  from  vil¬ 
lages]  of  the  Jews  the  retail  sale  of  spirits 


16 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


would  be  carried  on  by  tapsters  of  the  native 
rural  class,  so  that  drunkenness  would  not 
diminish,  but  only  a  decrease  would  take 
place  in  the  number  of  agriculturists.  A 
peasant  had  previously  been  in  the  habit  of 
selling  his  corn  on  the  spot  to  a  Jew,  but 
now  he  was  obliged  to  proceed  to  the  nearest 
town,  at  a  loss  in  time  and  labour,  to  sell 
his  produce  to  a*  Jew,  and  the  money 
realised  he  would  still  spend  on  brandy, 
bought  from  the  same  Jew.  The  same  re¬ 
sult  would  ensue  in  the  purchase  by  the 
peasant  of  articles  required  by  him,  such  as 
iron,  salt,  etc. 

“  The  Commission  also  found  it  unad- 
visable  to  allow  the  Jews  to  reside  in  vil¬ 
lages  under  the  prohibition  of  their  not  en¬ 
gaging  in  the  retail  sale  of  brandy;  this 
opinion  being  founded  on  the  following  con¬ 
sideration:  The  Jews  who  inhabit  the  vil¬ 
lages  belong  to  the  poorest  class,  and  if  not 
allowed  to  sell  spirits  they  would  be  de¬ 
prived  of  all  means  of  subsistence.  The 
poverty  of  the  peasantry  of  White  Kussia 


THE  RUSSIAN  JEW 


17 


is  not  caused  by  the  Jews,  and  this  is  proved 
by  the  fact  that  there  are  also  many  Jews 
in  the  southwestern  provinces,  yet  the 
peasantry  there  are  in  a  more  prosperous 
condition  than  those  populating  White 
Russia.  So  long  as  the  landlords  of  this 
latter  region  continue  to  adhere  to  their 
present  system  of  working  their  estates, 
which  encourages  drunkenness,  the  evil  will 
spread,  be  the  village  tapster  who  he  may, 
either  Jew  or  peasant.  This  is  confirmed 
by  the  example  of  the  provinces  of  Peters¬ 
burg,  Livonia,  and  Esthonia,  where  there 
are  no  Jews  and  yet  drunkenness  is  very 
prevalent. 

“  Should  the  Government  adopt  the 
proper  measures  for  making  the  sale  of 
brandy  less  lucrative,  the  Jews  would  be 
obliged  to  turn  to  other  pursuits,  perhaps 
to  those  of  husbandry,  especially  if  they  are 
accorded  the  right  of  purchasing  land.  If 
the  Jews  be  interdicted  to  sell  brandy  such 
sale  would  be  carried  on  by  the  peasants, 
who,  in  order  to  increase  their  landlord's 


18 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


revenue,  will  be  obliged  to  do  the  same  as 
the  Jews.  It  should  also  be  borne  in  mind 
that  the  Jews,  with  all  their  aptitude  and 
experience  in  matters  relating  to  the  sale  of 
spirits,  never  enriched  themselves  by  this 
calling,  but  only  earned  enough  for  their 
subsistence.  It  would  also  be  impossible  to 
convert  all  Jews  into  traders  and  artisans; 
firstly,  because  they  would  not  find  sufficient 
occupation  in  the  towns  and  hamlets,  where 
there  is  no  demand  for  a  great  supply  of 
services  of  this  kind ;  and  secondly,  because 
great  injury  would  be  inflicted  on  those 
Jews  who  are  unable  to  find  alternative 
sources  of  livelihood.  As  a  matter  of  fact 
the  retail  sale  of  spirits  in  the  western 
provinces  is  only  carried  on  by  those  Jews 
who  are  unable  to  find  any  other  means  of 
existence.  The  Jews  adhere  to  their  present 
occupations  because,  owing  to  the  want  of 
means,  the  Government  is  unable  to  effect 
any  radical  change  in  their  condition. 
Lastly,  the  Commission  arrived  at  the 
conclusion  that  it  was  necessary  to  re- 


THE  RUSSIAN  JEW 


19 


scind  entirely  paragraph  34  of  the  Law  of 
1804/' 

This  paragraph  of  the  law  thus  cited 
ordered  the  removal  of  all  Jews  from  vil¬ 
lages  and  hamlets  into  the  towns. 

The  recommendation  of  the  Commission 
was  not  acted  upon.  On  the  contrary,  the 
law  of  1804  was  continued.  Though  not 
vigorously  enforced  it  remained  as  a  po¬ 
tential  agency  for  rendering  residence  of 
employment  outside  the  Pale  a  source  of 
insecurity  to  the  Jews,  and  a  means  by 
which  police,  business  rivals,  and  others 
could  at  any  time  put  the  ukase  of  expulsion 
in  operation  against  them.  Trading  com¬ 
munities  were  most  active  in  appealing  for 
the  application  of  this  law.  Petitions  call¬ 
ing  for  expulsion  from  cities  and  towns  in 
which  Jews  were  rival  workers  and  dealers 
are  constantly  recurring  features  of  the 
tyranny,  official  and  commercial,  to  which 
they  were  subjected  during  the  next  half- 
century. 

General  Levashoff,  Governor  of  Kiev,  re- 


20 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


porting  to  the  Government  in  1833  upon  a 
petition  asking  for  the  banishment  of  all 
the  Jews  from  that  important  city,  laid  bare 
the  motives  and  condemned  the  selfish 
purpose  of  the  petitioners,  in  honestly  say¬ 
ing: 

It  is  desirable  on  the  ground  of  public 
utility  to  allow  the  Jews  to  remain  in  Kiev, 
where,  by  the  simplicity  and  moderation  of 
their  mode  of  life,  they  are  able  to  sell 
commodities  at  a  cheap  rate.  It  may 
positively  be  asserted  that  their  expulsion 
would  not  only  lead  to  an  enhancement  of 
prices  of  many  products  and  articles,  but 
that  it  will  not  be  possible  to  obtain  these 
at  all.  Under  these  circumstances  the  in¬ 
terests  of  the  mass  of  the  inhabitants  must 
be  preferred  to  the  personal  advantages 
which  the  Christian  trading  class  would 
derive  by  the  ejection  of  the  Jews.’’  * 

Opposed  in  cities  and  towns  in  this  man¬ 
ner,  after  being  turned  out  of  country  dis¬ 
tricts  in  obedience  to  a  similar  spirit,  the 
♦Observation  No.  6418,“  Code  of  Laws,’'  Vol.  VIII. 


THE  RUSSIAN  JEW 


21 


authors  of  these  coercion  laws  began  to  find 
it  a  serious  administrative  problem  what  to 
do  with  subjects  for  whose  systematic  op¬ 
pression  they  were  alone  responsible.  Agri¬ 
cultural  colonies  were  planned  in  Cherson 
(Southwestern  Russia  )  and  even  in  Siberia, 
to  which  Jews  were  induced  to  go  in  order 
to  escape  from  the  intolerable  hardships 
of  incessant  wrong.  Failure  followed 
these  benevolent  designs  of  the  Govern¬ 
ment;  not  from  the  reluctance  or  incapacity 
of  the  migrating  Jews  to  work  the  land,  but 
owing  to  the  corruption  and  incompetence  of 
officials  who  were  charged  with  the  superin¬ 
tendence  of  these  colonies.  Money  ad¬ 
vanced  for  the  building  of  dwellings  and 
purchase  of  stock  was  disbursed  in  the  erec¬ 
tion  of  unsuitable  houses,  in  most  unsan¬ 
itary  places,  and  in  other  wasteful  and 
ignorant  directions.  Great  hardships  were 
thus  entailed  upon  the  unfortunate  victims 
of  this  crass  official  stupidity ;  a  cruelty  of 
deliberate  neglect  adding,  in  the  instances 
of  the  migrations  to  Siberia,  its  penalties  of 


22 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


suffering  and  death  to  the  bitter  disappoint¬ 
ments  and  the  blasting  of  hopes  caused  bj 
the  callous  miscarriage  of  the  well-meant 
enterprise  of  the  Government  by  its  blun¬ 
dering  officials. 

One  unexpected  good  result  followed  both 
to  Russia  and  to  large  numbers  of  Jews  by 
the  failure  of  these  contemplated  agricul¬ 
tural  settlements  in  the  Governments  of 
Cherson  and  Ekaterinoslav ;  where,  at  a 
later  time,  similar  colonies  grew  and 
flourished.  Odessa,  to-day  the  richest  and 
busiest  maritime  city  of  the  Empire,  owes 
its  prosperity  and  progress  largely  to  Jew¬ 
ish  enterprise.  Both  the  forced  and  volun¬ 
tary  migration  from  the  north  to  the  south 
of  the  Pale  brought  this  resourceful  race 
near  where  they  were  to  find  an  outlet  in  a 
young  and  rising  commercial  centre  for 
qualities  essential  to  its  rapid  development 
which  Russians  do  not  themselves  possess 
in  any  marked  degree, — commercial  genius. 
The  city  and  its  varied  opportunities  at¬ 
tracted  both  those  who  succeeded  and  those 


THE  RUSSIAN  JEW 


23 


who  had  obtained  no  fair  chance  of  thriving 
as  agriculturists,  and  to-day  over  two  hun¬ 
dred  thousand  of  the  Jewish  population  of 
Odessa  embrace  the  wealthiest  and  most 
enterprising  bankers,  merchants,  brokers, 
contractors,  and  business  men  of  the  Em¬ 
pire. 

From  the  codification  of  the  ukases  and 
laws  relating  to  Jews  in  1835,  down  to  the 
Ignatiefi  or  May  Laws  ’’  of  1882,  the  treat¬ 
ment  of  the  Jews,  as  regulated  by  these 
measures,  is  consistent  with  their  expe¬ 
rience  as  already  briefly  described.  In  some 
of  these  laws,  Jews  would  appear  from  the 
text  to  be  on  a  footing  of  theoretic  equality 
with  other  citizens,  while  again  special 
provisions  are  made  to  limit  the  application 
of  these  general  rights  to  residence  within 
the  selected  sphere  of  domicile,  and  to  be 
further  curtailed  within  this  area,  in  the 
light  and  meaning  of  the  law  of  1804. 
There  is  a  bewildering  mass  and  maze  of 
contradictory  purpose  in  this  code  of  special 
lav^  which  no  summary  can  hope  intel- 


24 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


ligently  to  disentangle.  It  is  obvious,  how¬ 
ever,  that  the  vigour  of  direct  persecution 
is  meant  to  be  modified  to  the  extent  of  pro¬ 
moting  the  utilities  of  the  State  by  Jewish 
abilities,  while  reserving  all  the  powers 
necessary  to  dispense  with  the  objectionable 
artisan,  trader,  or  mechanic  when  his  ser¬ 
vices  or  example  are  no  longer  needed  in 
hamlet  or  village.  This  is  one  of  the  most 
objectionable  features  of  indefensible  laws. 
It  wears  a  character  of  state  meanness 
which  can  well  compare  in  odious  rivalry 
with  the  methods  and  morals  of  Jewish 
usury.  The  spirit  of  fair  play  is  totally 
absent  from  regulations  which  give  the 
state,  by  virtue  of  permissive  coercion, 
^  the  benefits  of  subjects^  services  which 
are  ultimately  repaid  in  penalties  and 
expulsion. 

In  1843  the  Pale  of  Settlement  was 
further  contracted  by  a  law  forbidding 
Jews  to  reside  within  a  distance  of  fifty 
versts  (about  thirty-three  miles)  of  the 
Austrian  or  German  frontiers.  The  neces- 


THE  RUSSIAN  JEW 


25 


sity  for  this  regulation  was  said  to  be  the 
smuggling  operations  of  the  Jews.  They 
probably  excelled  in  this  as  in  other  illegal 
practices,  to  which  they  were  driven  on 
being  denied  the  chances  of  living  by  more 
reputable  means.  The  injustice  of  punish¬ 
ing  thousands  of  families  who  had  resided 
in  these  frontier  districts  for  generations, 
for  the  wrongdoing  of  a  few  people,  would 
not  be  calculated  to  lessen  the  feeling  of 
settled  disloyalty  which  persistent  oppres¬ 
sion  must  inevitably  create  in  the  minds  of 
an  intellectual  race.  And,  these  accumulat¬ 
ing  measures  of  an  insensate  injustice  are 
now  responsible  for  the  existence  of  four 
millions  of  disaffected  subjects  adjacent  to 
the  frontiers  of  Russians  two  most  formi¬ 
dable  rival  powers,  Germany  and  Austro- 
Hungary.  The  Pale  of  Settlement  has  thus 
become,  by  the  lex  talionis  of  a  poetic  jus¬ 
tice,  the  most  vulnerable  part  of  the 
Russian  Empire.  It  is  not  alone  the  seed¬ 
bed  and  centre  of  Socialism,  born  of  per¬ 
secution,  it  is  a  military  weakness  well 


26 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


iriGasurGd  and  notGd  in  the  army  bureaus  of 
Berlin  and  Vienna. 

Under  the  Emperor  Alexander  II.,  the 
emancipator  of  the  serfs,  the  Jews  obtained 
a  respite  from  many  of  the  most  oppressive 
and  vexatious  of  the  penal  ukases.  Schools 
hitherto  closed  to  Hebrew  children  were 
thrown  open  to  their  admission.  Restric¬ 
tions  upon  attendance  at  fairs  in  the  interior 
were  removed,  while  in  many  other  respects 
the  original  plan  and  purpose  of  the  Pale 
were  forgotten,  and  the  dawn  of  happier 
days  began  to  rise  above  the  troubled  and 
darkened  horizon  of  the  Russian  Jew.  The 
freedom  of  the  peasants  gave  rise  to  the  hope 
that  the  same  liberal-minded  Tsar  would 
break  the  bonds  of  his  Semitic  subjects, 
when  there  fell  upon  all  this  promise  of 
brighter  times  the  bolt  of  Nihilist  venge¬ 
ance,  in  the  assassination  of  the  best  of 
Russia's  rulers.  The  abominable  deed, 
which  shocked  the  world  by  its  terrible 
character  and  results,  shattered  the  hopes 
of  Hebrew  emancipation,  and  led  to  the 


THE  RUSSIAN  JEW 


27 


savage  onslaught  which  was  made  upon  the 
objects  of  peasant  fury  in  1881  and  1882,  in 
many  parts  of  the  Empire. 

Beyond  doubt  there  were  some  Jews  con¬ 
cerned  in  Nihilist  plots.  The  man  who  at¬ 
tempted  to  kill  General  Loris  Melikoff  was 
of  Jewish  blood.  The  women  Lewinsohn 
and  Helfman,  who  were  sent  to  Siberia 
for  complicity  in  murder  conspiracies, 
were  Jewesses,  while  several  prominent 
Nihilists  were  believed  to  be  half  Hebrew 
in  parentage.  But  the  history  of  human  ^ 
oppression  always  explains,  even  where  it 
may  not  justify,  deeds  of  savage  political 
vengeance.  No  race  can  be  denied  the 
ordinary  franchises  of  personal  freedom 
the  right  to  live  secure  from  the  insult  and 
intrusion  of  a  tyrannical  law,  and  the  un¬ 
fair  infliction  of  exceptional  burdens— 
without  rousing  into  dangerous  activity 
passions  which  appeal  to  the  wild  impulse 
of  revenge.  The  assassination  of  Alexan¬ 
der  II.  had  nothing  to  do  with  the  coercion 
of  the  Jews.  He  was  not  their  enemy;  he 


28 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


was  their  friend.  But  the  revolutionary 
spirit  which  germinates  under  despotic  rule 
is  generally  blind  in  selecting  the  objects  of 
its  unreasoning  fury ;  just  as  many  Govern¬ 
ments  are  deaf  to  the  pleadings  of  an  en¬ 
lightened  justice  in  the  rule  of  a  country 
until  the  shock  of  some  desperate  deed  com¬ 
pels  them  to  think  of  that  which,  if  listened 
to  in  time,  would  protect  both  subjects  and 
monarchs  from  the  fear  and  consequences 
of  criminal  acts.  If  some  Jews  were  guilty 
accomplices  in  the  murder  of  a  humane 
Emperor,  so  were  Eussians.  And  it  would 
have  been  no  greater  wrong  to  punish  guilt¬ 
less  peasants  for  the  acts  of  the  Nihilists 
than  to  wreak  vengeance  upon  equally  inno¬ 
cent  Jews. 

In  Warsaw,  Kiev,  Eostov,  and  elsewhere 
Jews  were  killed,  their  houses  wrecked,  and 
their  shops  looted.  Outrages  occurred 
throughout  the  whole  Pale  of  Settlement, 
and  thousands  of  terrified  people  fied  across 
the  frontiers  into  Germany,  Bohemia,  and 
Eoumania.  These  outbreaks  occurred  near 


THE  RUSSIAN  JEW 


29 


the  end  of  1881  and  early  in  the  following 
year  and,  like  the  recent  massacres  in  Bes¬ 
sarabia,  aroused  a  widespread  expression  of 
sympathy  in  Europe  and  America  for  the 
hapless  objects  of  Russian  popular  fury. 
Manifestations  of  international  feeling 
greatly  impressed  the  Tsar’s  Government, 
and  earnest  efforts  appeared  to  have  been 
made  to  curb  the  lawless  conduct  of  the 
mobs.  This  action,  however,  instead  of 
being  a  promise  of  better  things,  turned  out 
to  be  but  a  prelude  to  sterner  measures  than 
ever  against  the  victims  of  exceptional 
laws. 

On  the  3d  of  May,  1882,  General  Igna- 
tieff  obtained  the  Emperor’s  sanction  and 
signature  to  what  have  since  been  known 
as  the  May  Laws”;  the  purpose  of  these 
being  to  add  more  rigorous  provisions,  as  a 
supplement  to  the  law  of  1804.  This  latter 
law  ordered  all  the  Jews  of  the  Empire  to 
retire  within  the  Pale  of  Settlement,  except¬ 
ing  those  who  possessed  special  permits, 
passports,  or  privileges  to  live  outside.  The 


30 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


May  Laws  ordered  Jews  living  inside  the 
Pale  to  remove  from  the  villages  into  the 
towns  within  that  area.  In  a  word,  Greneral 
Ignatieff  created  a  Pale  within  a  Pale,  and 
contracted  the  territory  of  life  and  liveli¬ 
hood  for  upwards  of  four  millions  of  people 
within  the  boundaries  of  the  cities  and 
towns  inside  the  already  limited  domain  of 
legal  domicile.  These  measures  read  as 
follows : 

The  Committee  of  Ministers,  having 
heard  the  report  of  the  Minister  of  the  In¬ 
terior  on  the  execution  of  the  temporary 
orders  concerning  the  Jews,  resolved : 

1.  As  a  temporary  measure,  and  until  a 
general  revision  has  been  made  in  a  proper 
manner  of  the  laws  concerning  the  Jews,  to 
forbid  the  Jews  henceforth  to  settle  outside 
the  towns  and  townlets,  the  only  exceptions 
admitted  being  in  those  Jewish  colonies  that 
have  existed  before  and  whose  inhabitants 
are  agriculturists. 

2.  To  suspend  temporarily  the  comple¬ 
tion  of  instruments  of  purchase  of  real 


THE  RUSSIAN  JEW 


31 


property  mortgages  in  the  name  of  Jews  ;  as 
also  the  registration  of  Jews  as  lessees  of 
landed  estates,  situated  outside  the  pre¬ 
cincts  of  towns  and  townlets,  and  the  issue 
of  powers  of  attorney  to  enable  them  to 
manage  and  dispose  of  such  property. 

3.  To  forbid  Jews  to  carry  on  business 
on  Sundays  and  on  Christian  holidays,  and 
that  the  same  laws  in  force,  about  the  clos¬ 
ing  on  such  days  of  places  of  business  be¬ 
longing  to  Christians,  shall,  in  the  same 
way,  apply  to  places  of  business  owned  by 
J  ews. 

4.  That  the  measures  laid  down  in  para¬ 
graphs  1,  2,  and  3,  apply  only  to  the  Govern¬ 
ments  vdthin  the  Pale  of  Jewish  Settlement. 
His  Majesty  the  Emperor  was  graciously 
pleased  to  give  his  assent  to  the  above  reso¬ 
lutions  of  the  Committee  of  Ministers,  on 
the  3d  of  May,  1882.’’ 

These  Laws  did  not  apply  to  the  Jews  of 
Poland. 

These  temporary  measures  ”  remain  to¬ 
day  the  potential  law  of  Russia  regarding 


32 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


Jews.  They  were  not  immediately  en¬ 
forced.  Russia  is  never  in  a  hurry  in  mat¬ 
ters  of  this  kind.  She  waits  and  notes  the 
material  results  of  such  enactments  at 
home,  and  the  moral  effects  upon  opinion 
abroad.  In  the  case  of  the  May  Laws,  there 
was  a  universal  chorus  of  condemnation  in 
Western  Europe.  It  was  felt  everywhere 
that  any  attempt  to  put  such  savage  meas¬ 
ures  into  operation  must  either  lead  to  the 
flight  of  hundreds  of  thousands  of  wretched 
Jews  over  the  borders,  or  to  their  death 
within  the  crowded  towns  of  the  Pale,  from 
starvation  induced  by  an  overwhelming  con¬ 
gestion  of  labour  without  means  of  employ¬ 
ment.  The  laws  were,  therefore,  left 
inoperative,  but  in  terrorem;  General  Ig- 
natieff  being  conveniently  superseded,  while 
a  Commission  presided  over  by  Count 
Pahlen  was  appointed  by  the  Emperor  to 
prepare  a  report  upon  the  whole  Jewish 
question. 


CHAPTER  III 


FROM  THE  IGNATIEFF  LAWS  TO  THE  KISHI- 

NEFF  MASSACRES 

PRINCE  DEMIDOFF  SAN  DONATO 
was  a  member  of  the  Pahlen  Com- 
misision,  and  in  his  admirable  work  La 
Question  Jtiive  en  Russie”  (published  at 
Bruxelles,  1884,)  he  gives,  in  his  own  pro¬ 
posed  solution  of  the  problem  of  the  Russian 
Jew,  the  broad  and  liberal  measures  which 
forced  themselves  upon  the  Commission  as 
an  essential  basis  for  a  settlement  of  the 
question  on  just  and  rational  lines.  He 
recommended  the  three  following  pro¬ 
posals  : 

(1)  For  the  re-establishment  of  more 
healthy  relations  between  the  J ews  and  the 
other  inhabitants  and  counteracting  Jewish 
industrial  and  other  exploitation  in  the 
western  region  [the  Pale  of  Settlement], 

33 


34 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


it  is  necessary  to  grant  the  Jews  complete 
civil  equality  and  freedom  of  choice  of 
residence.  This  would  lead  to  a  greater 
dissemination  of  the  Jewish  population, 
which  is  now  crowded  together  in  partic¬ 
ular  districts;  to  the  alleviation  of  the 
poverty  and  hopeless  condition  of  the  Jew¬ 
ish  masses,  and  would  relieve  the  part  of 
the  country  they  now  occupy  from  exces¬ 
sive  industrial  and  other  competition. 

(2)  In  order  to  destroy  Jewish  exclu¬ 
siveness  and  to  facilitate  the  fusion  of  the 
Jews  with  the  rest  of  the  population  it  is 
necessary  to  incorporate  the  Jews  with  the 
local  rural  and  urban  communities,  and  to 
subject  them  completely  in  fiscal,  admin¬ 
istrative,  and  other  respects  to  the  rules 
and  regulations  established  for  these  com¬ 
munities.  Those  Jews  who  would  wish  to 
settle  in  the  interior  provinces  should  be 
allowed  to  enjoy  the  right  of  joining  peas¬ 
ant  and  burgher  communities  in  the  places 
of  their  domicile  in  the  ordinary  way. 

(3 )  It  is  at  the  same  time  necessary  that 


THE  RUSSIAN  JEW 


35 


sGrious  attciition  should  be  directed  to¬ 
wards  the  organisation  of  elementary 
schools  for  the  juvenile  Jewish  population, 
inasmuch  as  the  school  must  always  be  one 
of  the  principal  instruments  for  the  moral 
training  and  Russification  of  the  Jewish 
masses.” 

These  were  the  common-sense  recommen¬ 
dations  of  an  enlightened  mind  for  the  cure 
of  a  growing  social  and  political  malady  in 
Russian  life.  They  would  have  effected 
that  cure,  had  there  been  a  statesmanship  in 
the  Government  of  the  Empire  capable  of 
rising  above  anti-Semitic  prejudice  in  the 
rendering  of  a  great  service  to  the  country. 
In  fact,  there  are  but  three  Russian 
remedies  for  this  growing  danger  to  Russia, 
and  two  of  them  are  impossible;  the  third 
being  the  rational  one  outlined  by  Prince 
Demidoff  San  Donato.  Extermination  can¬ 
not  be  thought  of.  Emigration  is  out  of  the 
question,  where  poverty  is  almost  the  nor¬ 
mal  condition  of  two  or  three  millions  of 
people  who  have  inherited  the  evils  asso- 


30 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


ciated  with  social  wretchedness,  religious 
intolerance,  and  race  persecution.  No  other 
country  will  consent  to  receive  them.  The 
third  remedy  is,  therefore,  that  alone  which 
the  nature  and  extent  of  the  evil  demand, 
and  which,  if  wisely  and  courageously 
adopted,  would  make  Kussia  the  stronger 
through  the  only  effective  remedy  appli¬ 
cable  to  a  growing,  deadly  danger. 

The  facts  of  the  economic  and  social  con¬ 
ditions  within  the  Pale  of  Settlement  are 
so  objective  that  the  warning  they  give  of  a 
coming  catastrophe  cannot  be  ignored.  It 
would  be  like  leaving  an  epidemic  of  small¬ 
pox  to  cure  itself  by  neglect.  This  condi¬ 
tion  of  things  is  fully  explained  and  ex¬ 
pressed  by  the  term,  unnatural.  It  is 
analogous  to  a  situation  which  would  result 
from  a  Federal  law  compelling  eveny 
European-born  artisan  and  labourer  within 
the  whole  United  States  to  reside  inside  of 
Pennsylvania,  and  to  be  forbidden  to  seek 
employment  outside  the  cities  and  towns  of 
that  state.  The  murderous  competition  for 


THE  RUSSIAN  JEW 


87 


employment,  the  deadly  rivalry  for  exist¬ 
ence,  the  bad  blood  between  opposing  races, 
the  poverty  and  social  wretchedness  which 
such  a  condition  of  things  would  create— 
apart  from  the  operation  of  coercive  laws — 
can  readily  be  imagined  by  the  American 
reader.  But  this  is  no  overdrawn  picture 
of  the  economic  anarchy  prevailing  within 
the  Russian  Pale  of  Jewish  Settlement. 

The  present  estimated  population  of  the 
TsaPs  dominions  in  Europe  and  Asia  is 
145,000,000.  The  territory  of  legal  domicile 
for  the  Russian  Jew  is  embraced  in  the 
fifteen  governments,’’  or  provinces,  of 
Kovno,  Vitebsk,  Vilna,  Mohilev,  Minsk, 
Grodno,  Volhynia,  Chernigov,  Poltava, 
Kiev,  Podolia,  Bessarabia,  Cherson,  Eka- 
terinoslav,  and  Taurida — extending  south 
from  near  the  Gulf  of  Riga,  on  the  Baltic, 
to  the  Crimea  and  the  Sea  of  Azov,  and 
forming  the  western  provinces  of  the  Em¬ 
pire;  having  Germany,  Austro-Hungary, 
and  Roumania  as  frontier  barriers.  Poland 
is  not  included  in  the  Pale.  The  Jews  have 


38 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


more_  freedom  of  movement  there,  and  are 
not  subject  to  some  of  the  coercive  restric¬ 
tions  imposed  within  the  above  provinces. 

The  Pale  itself  is  again  narrowed  by  the 
law  which  forbids  a  Jew  to  reside  within 
thirty-three  miles  of  the  western  frontier. 
It  has  a  total  area  about  equal  to  that  of 
France. 

The  population  of  the  fifteen  provinces  of 
the  Pale,  including  Poland,  will  be  about 
26,000,000.  There  are  some  4,000,000  Jews 
comprised  in  this  population,  but  these,  ex¬ 
cepting  1,000,000  in  Poland,  are  compelled 
under  the  May  Laws’^  to  reside  within 
the  cities,  towns,  and  townlets  ’’  of  the 
Pale.  The  united  population  of  these 
urban  centres  will  probably  not  exceed  a 
total  of  5,000,000;  so  that  the  Jews  num¬ 
ber  three  out  of  every  five  of  the  inhabitants 
of  the  urban  centres  within  the  fifteen 
provinces. 

The  percentage  of  Jews  to  non- Jews  in 
the  towns  and  townships  of  the  province  of 
Mohilev,  is  estimated  at  94;  for  those  of 


THE  RUSSIAN  JEW 


39 


Valhynia,  71  per  cent. ;  Minsk,  69 ;  Kovno, 
68;  Podolia,  62;  Vitebsk,  61;  Grodno,  60; 
Vilna,  56;  Kiev,  49;  Poltava,  43;  Bessa¬ 
rabia,  38 ;  Chernigov,  29 ;  Cherson,  28 ;  The 
Taurida,  19;  and  Ekaterinoslav,  15  per 
cent. 

In  the  provinces  of  Russia  in  which  Jews 
are  not  permitted  to  reside  the  town  in¬ 
habitants  average  59  persons  to  every  1000 
of  the  rural  population.  In  the  population 
of  the  Pale  the  urban  inhabitants  average 
222  for  every  1000  of  the  rural  residents 
and  workers.  Within  the  industrial  centres 
of  the  Jewish  Pale  to  which  they  are  con¬ 
fined  there  are  about  2730  Jews  to  every 
square  mile  of  residential  area. 

These  facts  and  figures  show  how  im¬ 
possible  it  is,  under  such  economic  condi¬ 
tions,  for  any  healthy  or  hopeful  prospect  of 
industrial  life  to  exist.  The  towns  are 
crowded  with  artisans  and  traders,  and  as 
these  are  out  of  all  proportion  to  the  pro¬ 
ducers  and  consumers  of  an  agricultural 
country  they  necessarily  become  more 


40 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


destitute  and  wretched  as  their  numbers 
increase.  They  are  too  poor  to  emigrate. 
They  are  prohibited  from  migrating.  They 
cannot  seek  work  on  land.  They  are  not 
permitted  to  engage  in  several  occupations. 
Municipal  and  Grovernment  posts  are  prac¬ 
tically  closed  to  them.  They  have  to  com¬ 
pete  with  Eussian  workers  for  such  means 
of  existence  as  can  be  found ;  and  in  face  of 
these  facts  they  are  reproached  for  their 
poverty  and  made  subject  to  special  taxa¬ 
tion. 

It  is  also  a  charge  against  these  people 
that  they  are  exploiters  of  labour  and  not 
producers.  The  taunt  comes  from  the 
apologists  for  the  Ignatieft  laws.  The 
charge  is  not  true.  In  proportion  to  popu¬ 
lation,  there  are  relatively  more  artisans 
among  Jews  in  Russia  than  among  non- 
Jews.  According  to  statistics  obtained  by 
the  Pahlen  Commission,  the  artisans  and 
labourers  averaged  15  per  cent,  of  the  total 
Jewish  population  of  the  Pale.  In  England 
the  proportion  of  labourers  and  artisans  is 


THE  RUSSIAN  JEW 


41 


over  20  per  cent.  ^  nbout  12  per  cent,  in  Bel* 
gium ;  10  per  cent,  in  France,  and  9  in  Prus¬ 
sia. 

In  KisFineff,  where  the  Jews  number 
50,000  of  the  city  population,  the  Hebrew 
artisans,  and  wage-earners  generally,  would 
number  fully  10,000  before  the  recent  anti- 
Semitic  outrages. 

Nor  can  the  injustice  of  the  May  Laws 
be  defended  or  explained  by  the  equally  un¬ 
founded  assertion  that  the  Jew  will  not 
work  the  land.  He  refuses  to  do  so  in  Russia 
only  where  he  is  prohibited.  W^henever  he 
has  obtained  access  to  the  land,  on  fair 
terms,  he  has  readily  embraced  the  chance, 
and  invariably  improved  his  condition. 
This  has  been  proved  by  the  records  of  the 
Jewish  agricultural  colonies  in  the  provinces 
of  Vilna,  Minsk,  Grodno,  Kovno,  Volhynia, 
Cherson,  and  in  Ekaterinoslav.  There  are 
colonies  of  more  than  50,000  land-workers 
among  the  Jews  of  the  southwestern  prov¬ 
inces  who  have  more  than  held  their  own 
in  every  branch  of  agricultural  industry 


42 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


with  their  Russian  or  Moldavian  neigh¬ 
bours.  This  taunt  is,  consequently,  no 
explanation  of  the  Ignatieff  laws. 

The  evils— both  to  Russia  and  to  the  Jews 
of  the  Pale — arising  out  of  the  economic 
conditions  which  these  laws  must  stereo¬ 
type,  would  have  been  swept  away  or  modi¬ 
fied  in  the  ten  years  following  the  killing 
and  despoiling  of  the  Jews  in  1882,  had  the 
proposals  of  the  Pahlen  Commission  been 
acted  upon.  The  recommendations  of 
provincial  governors  were  preferred  in¬ 
stead.  Biassed  officialism  prevailed  over 
the  courageously  wise  counsels  of  Count 
Pahlen,  Prince  Demidoff  San  Donato,  Count 
Strogonoff,  and  their  colleagues,  with  the 
result  that  M.  Pobedonostsev  became  the 
virtual  administrator  of  the  Ignatieff  laws, 
and  the  murders,  crimes,  and  expulsions  of 
1891  followed,  in  decadal  sequence,  the  out¬ 
rages  of  1882;  not,  by  any  means,  as  a 
desired  or  necessary  measure  of  the  policy 
adopted  by  the  famed  Procurator  of  the 
Holy  Synod.  M.  Pobddonostsev  would  be 


THE  RUSSIAN  JEW 


43 


as  averse  to  the  killing  of  Jews  as  General 
Ignatieft.  Both  are  far  above  suspicion  in 
this  respect.  The  instigator  of  the  May 
Laws  ”  probably  believed,  as  a  soldier  and 
diplomat,  that  such  measures  were  needed 
the  better  to  subdue  a  suspected  revolution¬ 
ary  tendency  among  a  non-Russian  race, 
and  thought  they  might  be  enforced  accord¬ 
ing  to  his  plans,  without  any  serious  ex¬ 
plosion  of  anti-Semitic  feeling.  What 
followed,  however,  ought  to  have  ‘been  a 
warning  to  the  keeper  of  the  Tsar’s  con¬ 
science  on  combined  religious  and  national 
concerns.  The  Procurator’s  plans  would  be 
as  religious  in  their  ultimate  object  as 
Ignatieff’s  policy  was  the  reverse;  but  both 
sought  the  accomplishment  of  a  tyrannical 
purpose  by  means  which  led  to  such  suffer¬ 
ing,  injustice,  and  bloodshed  as  will  ever  be 
associated  with  their  records  and  names. 

The  Russian  Jew  was  a  domestic  menace 
to  the  mind  of  Ignatieff ;  to  M.  Pob^donost- 
sev  he  was  tainted  with  the  unforgivable 
sins  of  heterodoxy,  and  a  religious  persecu- 


44 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


tor  is  always  relentless  in  proportion  to  his 
fanatical  sincerity.  No  one  can  justly 
question  the  honesty  of  the  Procurator’s 
zeal  for  Church  and  State  in  Russia.,  and 
this  is  why  the  infidel  Israelites  have  found 
in  him  the  most  implacable  of  their  power¬ 
ful  foes. 

The  measures  resorted  to  in  1891,  at  the 
instance  of  the  influence  exerted  by  the 
Procurator  of  the  Holy  Synod,  had  for  their 
end  the  carrying  into  effect  of  the  provisions 
of  the  May  Laws.”  Thousands  of  Jews 
were  still  scattered  throughout  the  prov¬ 
inces  beyond  the  Pale;  tolerated  in  centres 
of  trade  and  enterprise  for  utilitarian  rea¬ 
sons.  Most  of  these  were  artisans  who 
had  by  residence,  and  membership  of  trade 
guilds,  acquired  the  privilege  of  living  and 
working  in  various  provinces  of  the  Empire. 
Large  numbers  of  these  had  been  specially 
encouraged  in  previous  years  to  settle  in 
cities  and  towns  where  their  proficiency  in 
crafts  was  necessary  to  the  development  of 
local  industries  or  manufacture.  Suddenly 


THE  RUSSIAN  JEW 


45 


in  1891  an  Imperial  decree  was  issued,  and 
all  these  sober,  industrious,  skilled,  and,  in 
many  instances,  respected  citizens  were 
ordered  to  quit  their  homes,  property,  or 
employment,  within  a  given  time,  and  take 
themselves  within  the  Pale  of  Settlement  or 
outside  of  the  Russian  Empire. 

The  orders  issued  by  the  Chief  of  Police 
of  Moscow  to  his  subordinates,  contained 
the  following  instructions : 

You  must  personally  verify  in  all  the 
.  shops  and  factories  kept  hj  Jews  the  num¬ 
ber  of  the  assistant  artisans;  also,  what 
category  the  Jews  belong  to,  and  the  time 
of  their  arrival  in  Moscow  for  residence; 
and  then  take  their  signature  to  a  notice  of 
voluntary  [ !]  departure  from  the  Capital , 
warning  them  that  the  computation  of  their 
terms  of  stay  will  begin  on  the  14th  of 
Julv  next.  Also,  take  a  registry  of  names, 

C/ 

in  alphabetical  order,  of  Jewish  artisans 
and,  second,  of  Jews  living  in  Moscow 
under  the  right  of  Circular  No.  30  issued 
bv  the  Minister  of  the  Interior  in  1880, 

t/ 


46  WITHIN  THE  PALE 

specifying  in  separate  columns  the  time 
of  arrival  in  Moscow,  number  of  assistant 
artisans,  number  in  family,  and  the 
expiration  of  the  term  of  departure.  In 
reference  to  Jews  residing  according  to  Cir¬ 
cular  of  1880,  specify  their  occupations, 
also  the  names  of  commercial  houses  where 
they  were  employed,  and  present  them  to 
me  within  two  weeks.” 

The  penalty  for  refusing  to  sign  the  paper 
suggested  by  General  Yourkoffsky,  was  im¬ 
mediate  expulsion.  The  ''  voluntary  ”  alter¬ 
native  gained  only  a  little  time  for  prepara¬ 
tion.  It  offered,  however,  some  chances  to 
wealthy  Jews  to  come  to  an  arrangement 
with  lower  police  officials,  whereby  the  gen¬ 
eral  order  of  expulsion  might  be  evaded,  for 
a  consideration. 

The  attack  by  Government  and  people 
upon  the  J ews  in  1891  was  a  deliberate  pro¬ 
ceeding,  Prince  Dolgorouki  was  an  able 
and  a  fair-minded  Governor-General  of 
Moscow.  Neither  Russian  nor  Jewish  com¬ 
plaint  had  been  lodged  against  him  during 


THE  RUSSIAN  JEW 


47 


his  tenure  of  office.  His  duties  had  been 
performed  with  care  and  competency,  and 
his  administration  of  the  ancient  capital 
and  province  left  no  room  for  official  fault¬ 
finding  at  St.  Petersburg. 

Coincidently  with  a  notification  to  all 
Governors  of  Provinces  in  the  Emperor’s 
name,  that  all  permits  to  allow  Jews  to  re¬ 
side  outside  of  the  Pale  should  be  with¬ 
drawn  on  a  certain  date,  an  order  for  the 
removal  of  the  Governor-General  of  Mos¬ 
cow  was  also  made,  and  the  Tsar’s  brother, 
the  Grand  Duke  Sergius,  was  nominated  to 
supersede  General  Dolgorouki.  General 
Kostanda  was  to  act  as  Deputy  Governor; 
pending  the  arrival  of  Duke  Sergius,  and  to 
this  officer,  along  with  the  equally  zealous 
anti-Semite,  Yourkofisky,  Chief  of  the  Mos¬ 
cow  Police,  was  left  the  congenial  task  of 
clearing-out  ”  the  Jews.  Never  was  an 
odious  work  more  brutally  performed.  The 
quarter  in  which  the  poorest  Jews  resided 
was  surrounded  in  the  night  time  by  the 
police  and  fire-brigade  forces,  and  the  un- 


48 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


happy  creatures  were  routed  from  their 
dwellings  as  if  they  were  so  many  noxious 
animals.  Some  who  had  been  warned  a  few 
hours  beforehand  fled  to  the  CeMetcLires  of 
the  city  for  protection,  whil^  it  has  been 
placed  on  record  that  several  fathers  of 
families  took  their  daughters  to  houses  of 
ill-fame  for  the  night,  presumably  to  find 
protection  where  they  would  be  least  sus¬ 
pected  of  seeking  refuge. 

All  this  being  done  in  the  name  of  the 
Tsar,  the  populace  were  encouraged  to  co¬ 
operate  in  executing  what  they  were  led  to 
believe  to  be  the  Emperor’s  wish.  Mas¬ 
sacres,  raping,  and  looting  became  once 
more  the  direct  results  of  barbarous  decrees. 
Some  3000  Jews  were  driven  from  Moscow 
after  many  had  been  killed.  Hundreds  of 
business  men  were  ruined,  being  compelled 
to  close  their  establishments,  and  to  dispose 
of  valuable  stock  at  prices  which  could  not 
realise  enough  to  discharge  their  obliga¬ 
tions.  Those  who  were  able  to  purchase 
transport  to  America  emigrated,  but  the 


THE  RUSSIAN  JEW 


49 


*• 


mass  of  the  expelled  victims  wended  their 
way  toward  the  Pale,  there  to  add  still  more 
to  the  congestion  of  life  and  labour  which 
had  already  rendered  the  vast  Ghetto  of 
the  Empire  the  home  of  poverty,  suffering, 
and  despair. 

The  example  set  in  Moscow  was  followed 
in  Kiev  and  other  cities,  and  encouraged 
police  and  mobs  elsewhere  to  emulate  the 
inhuman  work  of  hunting  the  hated  race 
from  villages  and  towns.  Throughout  the 
year  1891  outrages  were  perpetrated  in  vari¬ 
ous  provinces,  despite  some  apparently  ear¬ 
nest  efforts  on  the  part  of  the  Government 
to  stop  the  more  violent  outbreaks  which 
had  been  provoked  by  its  own  orders.  Sev¬ 
eral  villages  where  Jews  resided  were 
burned  down.  Fully  70,000  Jews  emi¬ 
grated  during  the  year;  this  fact  confirming, 
in  part  only,  a  saying  attributed  to  a  con¬ 
spicuous  personality  in  the  Tsar’s  confi¬ 
dence,  that  the  Russian  Jewish  question 
would  be  ultimately  solved  by  the  action  of 
the  “  May  Laws,”  as  these  would  force  one- 


50 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


third  of  the  Jews  to  emigrate;  one- third 
more  would  become  converted  to  the  Ortho¬ 
dox  Church;  while  the  other  third  would 
perish  of  hunger ! 

Whatever  may  be  the  desire  of  the  more 
violent  anti-Semitic  Eussians  to  see  such  an 
unparalleled  programme  realised  in  results, 
there  can  be  no  doubt  as  to  the  efficiency  of 
the  anti- Jewish  code  of  Russian  laws  to 
work  out  such  a  solution,  if  it  were  a  task 
legally  possible  of  accomplishment. 

Allusion  has  already  been  briefly  made  to 
the  tangle  of  contradictory  laws  which  the 
ukases,  decrees,  promulgations,  and  provi¬ 
sions  relating  to  the  Russian  Jew  have 
created.  Many  of  these  measures  appear  to 
have  been  adopted  under  the  pressure  of 
unreflecting  prejudice  or  apprehension. 
Some  bear  the  impress  of  wise  and  humane 
intentions,  born,  however,  in  the  minds  of 
Ministers  orMonarchs  too  weak  to  carry  out 
the  enlightened  impulse  which  gave  them 
birth.  But  the  vast  proportion  of  these  re¬ 
pressive  and  oppressive  laws  are  frankly 


THE  RUSSIAN  JEW 


51 


tyrannical  in  inspiration  and  purpose,  and 
the  spirit  that  could  suggest  measures  which 
are  a  deliberate  violation  of  the  fundamental 
principles  and  rights  of  civilised  existence 
would  be  a  feeling  worthy  to  animate  the 
task  of  carrying  the  above  programme  into 
execution. 


CHAPTER  IV 


A  MURDER-MAKING  LEGEND 
DE  PLEHVE  and  the  Tsar  can  ac- 


-LT-L..  eomplish  one  good  and  blessed 
work,  if  so  minded,  without  altering  a  single 
anti-Semitic  Russian  law.  The  Emperor 
can  destroy,  in  Russia,  the  atrocious  legend 
about  the  annual  killing  of  Christian  chil¬ 
dren  by  J ews  as  an  alleged  part  of  the  Blood 
Atonemeut  in  Hebrew  Paschal  rites.  In  this 
humane  and  Christian  task  he  is  entitled  to 
the  co-operation  of  the  Emperor  of  Aus¬ 
tria,  the  King  of  Roumania,  and  the  heads 
of  other  Balkan  States,  where  this  story  of 
ritual  murder  is  constantly  circulated,  and 
not  infrequently  as  a  part  of  political  propa¬ 
ganda.  There  ought  to  be  a  truly  Christian 
crusade  waged  against  this  infamous  prod¬ 
uct  of  ancient,  insensate,  sectarian  hate.  It 
was  the  inspiration  of  the  most  horrible  of 


63 


THE  RUSSIAN  JEW 


53 


the  Kishineff  murders ;  the  driving  of  nails 
through  the  eyes  of  a  woman,  the  cutting 
out  of  the  tongue  of  a  two-year-old  child, 
and  of  nameless  sexual  mutilations.  Thou¬ 
sands  of  innocent  people  have  been  done  to 
death  in  the  centuries  through  which  these 
crimes  have  been  the  bloody  fruit  of  a  mon¬ 
strous  invention,  born  of  a  spirit  of  super¬ 
stitious  savagery,  which  no  age  has  yet 
made  any  honest  civilised  endeavour  to  ex¬ 
orcise  out  of  ignorant  and  fanatical  Chris¬ 
tian  minds. 

The  Jews  of  Kishineff  believe  with  all 
right-minded  people  everywhere  that  no  one 
deplores  these  shocking  crimes  more  than 
the  Emperor.  His  humanity  is  beyond  ques¬ 
tion  in  popular  belief,  and,  should  a  suitable 
opportunity  be  given,  or  be  forthcoming, 
while  the  recollection  of  this  great  stain  on 
his  country’s  reputation  remains  in  the  pub¬ 
lic  memory,  he  may  be  counted  upon,  it  is  to 
be  hoped,  to  place  on  record  his  honest  con¬ 
demnation  of  such  abominable  deeds. 

Let  His  Majesty  the  Tsar  add  this  task  m 


54 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


other  noble  duties  with  which  his  name  is 
associated.  A  special  ukase,  reciting  his 
own  disbelief  in  the  ritual-murder  legend, 
and  forbidding  under  severe  penalties  its 
circulation  anywhere,  and,  by  any  means,  in 
Russia  ;  ordering  that  this  ukase  sihall  be 
read,  in  the  Emperor’s  name,  in  every 
church  in  the  Empire,  a  fortnight  before 
Easter  each  year  for  the  next  five  years ;  let 
this  be  done,  and  the  good  work  is  virtually 
accomplished  for  Christianity,  for  civilisa¬ 
tion,  and  for  Russia,  too. 

A  similar  obligation  lies  upon  the  govern¬ 
ments  of  Austria  and  of  the  Balkan  States. 
Roumania  is  at  present  the  worst  of  sinners 
in  this  matter.  This  legend  is  in  constant 
circulation  through  the  anti-Semitic  press 
there,  being  used,  in  fact,  as  an  argument  in 
political  campaigns  for  driving  the  Jews  out 
of  the  country. 

A  few  months  ago,  a  Roumanian  paper, 
the  Yocea  Tutovei  of  Berlad,  openly  incited 
the  populace  to  kill  the  Jews.  In  a  series  of 
articles,  subsequently  reprinted  in  pamphlet 


THE  RUSSIAN  JEW 


55 


form,  popular  ignorance  and  passion  were 
appealed  to  by  stories  of  alleged  Hebrew 
murders  of  Christian  children.  One  extract 
from  this  organ  of  Roumanian  opinion  will 
illustrate  at  once  the  savage  sentiments  of 
the  writer  and  the  culpable  conduct  of  a 
government  which  could  permit  such  ap¬ 
peals  to  assassination  to  be  openly  made  in 
a  civilised  land : 

“  The  recent  ritual  murders  committed  by 
Jev^s  in  Austria,,  Bohemia,  Hungary,  Ger¬ 
many,  and  Russia  must  still  be  fresh  in 
everyone^s  mind.  And  how  many  children 
have  disappeared  in  our  own  country !  How 
many  mutilated  bodies  have  been  found, 
while  the  criminals  have  remained  undis¬ 
covered!  Who  are  these  criminals — these 
bloodthirsty  murderers  of  our  prattling 
babes?  They  are  the  fanatical  Jews  that 
infest  our  land.  These  monsters  are  the 
slayers  of  our  Christian  children.  They 
are  the  criminals^ — the  Jews  who  have  in¬ 
vaded  our  country  like  locusts. 


66 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


The  time  for  peaceful  and  legal  re¬ 
strictions  is  passing  away.  Let  all  good 
Roumanians  raise  their  heavy  sticks  and 
kill  these  parasites  of  their  country.’’ 

Roumania  is  the  western  boundary  of 
Bessarabia.  Before  the  Berlin  Treaty  of 
1878,  a  portion  of  this  now  Russian  prov¬ 
ince  belonged  to  Roumania.  Moldavians 
live  on  each  side  of  the  frontier.  The 
pamphlets  circulated  by  the  anti-Semites  of 
Berlad,  containing  the  above  and  other 
murderous  appeals  to  fanaticism,  would  in¬ 
evitably  find  their  way  into  the  Moldavian 
community  of  Kishineff,  where  Pavolachi 
Kroushevan,  himself  a  Moldavian,  was  car¬ 
rying  on  a  similar  bloodthirsty  propaganda 
in  the  Bessarahetz  against  the  Jews  of 
Bessarabia.  The  Governments  which  con¬ 
tinue  to  permit  this  kind  of  press  savagery 
are  themselves  morally  responsible  for  the 
crimes  which  find  their  instigation  in  such 
writings.  Nor  can  diplomatic  denunciation, 
after  the  occurrence  of  deeds  of  infamy  such 


THE  RUSSIAN  JEW 


57 


as  those  of  Kishineff,  atone  in  any  way  to 
the  outraged  sense  of  civilised  human  feel¬ 
ing  for  what  Leo  Tolstoyjrightly  terms  the 

permitted  assassinations  of  innocent 
people.  For  the  law  or  Government  which 
encourages  by  indifference  the  circulation 
of  these  atrocious,  fabricated  tales  of  the 
slaughtering  of  Christian  children  by  He¬ 
brews,  is  either  the  indifferent  guardian 
of  citizens^  lives  or  the  cowardly  accom¬ 
plice  of  a  fanatical  ruffianism  which  it 
is  unable  or  unwilling  to  grapple  with  and 
put  down. 

There  is  another  and  a  higher  authority 
that  can  deal  with  the  propagation  of  this 
crime-stained  legend,  especially  in  Catholic 
countries  like  Austria  and  Poland.  This  is 
the  authority  of  the  Holy  See. 

A  few  years  ago  a  parish  priest  of  Vienna 
revived  the  old  story  of  the  alleged  murder 
of  the  boy  Simon  of  Treaty  for  ritual  pur¬ 
poses,  by  Jews  in  the  fifteenth  century.  He 
republished  particulars  of  what  purported 
to  be  the  crime  so  named,  but  unfairly  sup- 


58 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


pressed  tlie  facts  associated  with  the  accu¬ 
sation,  which  would  explain  the  whole 
charge  away.  The  Jews  who  had  confessed 
to  the  murder  of  the  boy  did  so  under  the 
application  of  torture;  a  pretty  common 
method  of  extorting  desired  information  ” 
of  trumped-up  charges  by  the  various  au¬ 
thorities  in  the  Middle  Ages.  The  confes¬ 
sion  thus  wrung  from  the  accused  by  the 
application  of  the  rack  led  to  their  execu¬ 
tion,  but  it  is  on  record  that  Pope  Sixtus  IV. 
denounced  their  conviction  and  death  as  a 
murder. 

The  reverend  anti-Semite  tried  his  hand 
again,  in  the  same  line,  in  conjunction  with 
a  renegade  Jew,  and  came  to  grief.  One 
Paul  Meyer  revealed  ”  how  a  Christian 
boy,  to  his  (Meyer^s)  own  knowledge,  w^as 
kidnapped  and  slaughtered  for  the  purposes 
of  Paschal  rites  by  the  hated  Hebrews. 
The  sensational  story  was  published  in  an 
anti-Semitic  Vienna  newspaper.  This  was 
a  deliberate  challenge  to  inquiry  and  refuta¬ 
tion.  The  challenge  was  accepted  by  the 


THE  RUSSIAN  JEW 


59 


Jews  of  the  city,  in  a  prosecution  of  the 
Vaterland,  when  Meyer  confessed  in  open 
court  that  the  whole  story  was  an  invention 
of  his  own,  palmed  off  on  both  the  priest 
and  the  public. 

An  ex-professor  of  Hebrew  in  the  Univer¬ 
sity  of  Prague,  an  enthusiastic  student  of 
Eastern  cabalistic  writings,  has  contributed 
very  materially  to  the  revival  in  Poland, 
Bohemia.,  and  Austria  of  these  miserable 
inventions.  He  has  written  a.  work  in  Latin 
on  the  subject,  and  he  gives  the  impression 
of  a,n  honest  fanatic  who  is  in  the  grip  of  a 
mysterious  investigation.  He  also  falls 
back  upon  a  converted  Jew  as  a  guide,  and 
is  led  to  believe  in  the  authenticity  of  cer¬ 
tain  cabalistic  writings  shown  to  him  by 
this  man,  Brimamo'.  He  quotes  from  one  of 
these  books,  the  Ha-likkutim,^’  a  passage 
which  the  credulous  padre  is  convinced 
proves  the  employment  of  the  blood  of  Chris¬ 
tian  maidens  in  these  unhallowed  Hebrew 
ceremonies.  This  quotation  is  found,  on 
critical  examination,  to  refer  to  a  passage  in 


60 


WITHIN  THE  PAI.E 


the  Bible  dealing  with  the  supernatural 
world,  in  which  the  colour  of  the  blood  of  a 
virgin  is  taken  as  emblematical  of  the  Day 
of  Judgment,  There  is  nothing  whatever 
beyond  this  in  Brimamo’s  work  to  justify 
the  inference  that  Christian  maidens’  blood 
is  sometimes  used  in  Jewish  sacrifices. 

In  the  same  book  Canon  Kohling  draws 
upon  other  cabalistic  documents  for  sug¬ 
gestions  and  innuendoes  tending  to  uphold 
his  case,  but  in  every  instance  in  which  he 
quotes  passages  to  support  his  proposi¬ 
tions,  they  are  found,  on  close  inspection, 
to  convey  no  such  meaning  as  he  attempts 
to  attach  to  them.  There  is  not,  in  fact,  a 
solitary  authenticated  instance  of  this  san¬ 
guinary  sacrifice  given  in  his  two  works, 
“  My  Replies  to  the  Rabbis,”  and  “  The 
Controversy  and  the  Human  Sacrifices  of 
Rabbinism,”  both  published  in  1883.  Still, 
these  writings  have  been  widely  read,  and 
have  done  much  harm  in  misleading  minds 
that  look  for  truth  and  Christian  guidance 
from  clerical  authors. 


THE  RUSSIAN  JEW 


61 


Can  nothing  effective  be  done  to  kill  this 
legend  ?  I  quote  in  an  appendix,  some 
pronouncements  from  Bulls  issued  by  Popes 
Innocent  IV.,  Gregory  X.,  Martin  V., 
Nicholas  V.,  and  Paul  III.,  all  reprobating 
this  blood  accusation  as  being  a  groundless 
and  monstrous  invention,  and  a  general  pre¬ 
text  for  the  plundering  of  Jews.  These  en¬ 
lightened  words  of  denunciation  were  ad¬ 
dressed  to  the  rulers,  prelates,  and  people  of 
the  Middle  Ages,  some  of  them  so  far  back 
as  six  hundred  years  ago.  Can  this  example 
not  be  followed  now  when  the  reputable 
press  of  all  civilised  countries  would  will- 
^^S^ly  co-operate  in  a  just  crusade  against 
this  hoary-headed,  crime-stained  infamy? 

It  has  been  urged  that  as  anti-Semitism 
in  France,  Austria,  and  Germany  is  a  politi¬ 
cal  movement,  a  denunciation  of  the  use  of 
the  murder-legend  calumny  would  probably 
be  misconstrued.  This  is  a  highly  sensitive 
but  very  inconsistent  position.  Surely, 
when  Socialism — which  is  a  far  greater  and 
nobler  political  movement  in  each  of  these 


62  WITHIN  THE  PALE _ 

countries— can  be  vigorously  condemned,  on 
assumed  moral  and  Catholic  grounds;  an 
agitation  relying  upon  literature  and  le¬ 
gends,  convicted  of  forgery  and  lies,  and 
condemned  again  and  again  by  the  Holy 
See  itself ;  and  which  has  the  killing  or  tor¬ 
ture  of  fellow  beings  as  its  ultima  ratio, 
should  claim  some  measure  of  earnest  repu¬ 
diation  and  moral  censure  at  the  hands  of 
Catholic  Powers,  temporal  and  spiritual. 

His  Holiness  Pope  Pius,  the  Emperor  of 
Austria,  and  the  Tsar  could  easily  draw  the 
fangs  of  this  murder  legend.  To  no  other 
minds  in  Christendom  could  the  consequen¬ 
ces  of  this  horrible  calumny  of  long  and  in¬ 
famous  vitality  be  more  odious  or  hateful. 
It  is  a  reproach  and  disgrace  to  Chris¬ 
tianity  that  certain  notorious  clerical  or¬ 
gans  in  France  and  Austria  persistently  cir¬ 
culate  these  incitations  to  fanatical  outrage, 
and  a  stain  upon  the  political  life  of  Aus¬ 
tria,  Eoumania,  and  Eussia,  whose  govern¬ 
ments  tolerate  this  poisonous  propaganda. 
It  is  a  pestiferous  evil  that  could  be  readily 


THE  RUSSIAN  JEW 


63 


stamped  out  if  the  wish  and  will  to  rid  Eu¬ 
rope  of  its  baleful  influence  could  overcome 
the  opportunist  counsels  of  a  spiritless  en¬ 
tourage,  which  prevent  the  three  best  and 
greatest  potentates  in  Europe  from  realis¬ 
ing  all  the  evils,  religious,  moral,  and  po¬ 
litical,  that  spring  from  this  perennial 
source  of  shameless  sectarian  rancour, 
bloodshed,  and  crime. 


CHAPTER  V 


RUSSIAN’S  ATTITUDE 

HE  absolute  truth  about  the  plan  and 


purpose  of  the  massacres  at  Kishi- 
netf  in  April  may  be  difficult  to  determine 
amidst  the  conflicting  accounts  of  Russian 
officials,  and  of  Jewish  witnesses  of  what 
actually  occurred.  The  wronged  and  the 
wrongers  seldom  or  ever  agree  as  to  dis¬ 
puted  facts.  But  there  can  be  no  doubt 
upon  any  mind  conversant  with  the  state  of 
Russian  feeling,  and  the  trend  of  Russia’s 
domestic  policy,  as  to  the  intolerable  posi¬ 
tion  of  the  Hebrew  subjects  of  the  Tsar.  No 
facts  are  concealed  in  this  connection. 
They  are  as  objective  and  undisguised  as  the 
Russian  policeman,  and  as  patent  to  every 
inquirer  from  Odessa  to  Warsaw  as  the 
rivers  Dniester  and  Vistula.  I  brought 
away  with  me  after  a  journey  through  the 


64 


THE  RUSSIAN  JEW 


65 


Jewish  Pale,  the  conviction  that  there  is  no 
horizon  of  hope  for  the  Russian  Jew  in  any 
prospective  era  of  future  emancipatian. 
He  is  and  will  remain  an  alien  until  the 
politically  impossible  comes  to  be  a  reality 
— until  the  Empire  of  the  Tsar  elects  to 
adopt  a  government  of  constitutional 
liberty. 

He  is  under  no  personal  or  political  re¬ 
straint,  it  is  true,  in  the  matter  of  emigra¬ 
tion.  The  J ews  are  free  to  leave  Russia  to¬ 
morrow.  Such  freedom  of  action,  however, 
is  like  the  tempting  waters  which  only 
aggravated  the  thirst  of  Tantalus  by  the 
mockery  of  a  nearness  made  impossible 
to  reach.  The  poverty  of  the  vast  mass 
of  these  unfortunate  people  renders  the 
thought  of  finding  refuge  in  America  or  the 
Argentine  a  hopeless  dream.  And,  as  an 
educated  Russian  official  said,  in  discussing 
this  question  with  the  writer,  What  can 
we  do  with  them?  They  are  the  racial 
antithesis  of  our  nation.  A  fusion  with  us 
is  impossible,  owing  to  religious  and  other 


66 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


disturbing  clauses.  They  will  always  be  a 
potential  source  of  sectariain  and  economic 
disorder  in  our  country.  We  cannot  admit 
them  to  equal  rights  of  citizenship  for  these 
reasons  and,  let  me  add,  because  their  in¬ 
tellectual  superiority  would  enable  them  in 
a  few  years^  time  to  gain  possession  of  most 
of  the  posts  of  our  civil  administration. 
They  are  a  growing  danger  of  a  most  serious 
nature  to  our  Empire  in  two  of  its  most 
vulnerable  points, — ^their  discontent  is  a 
menace  to  us  along  the  Austrian  and  Ger¬ 
man  frontiers,  while  they  are  the  active 
propagandists  of  the  Socialism  of  Western 
Europe  within  our  borders.  The  only  solu¬ 
tion  of  the  problem  of  the  Russian  Jew  is 
his  departure  from  Russia.’^ 

This  is  the  conclusion  to  which  one  is 
irresistibly  driven  by  a  full  survey  of  the 
cruelly  anomalous  position  occupied  by  the 
Jew  in  relation  to  all  the  dominant  factors 
of  Russian  life  and  government.  He  is 
under  the  obligations  of  citizenship,  mili¬ 
tary  and  otherwise,  without  its  privileges  or 


THE  RUSSIAN  JEW 


67 


full  protection.  Special  taxes  are  imposed 
upon  him.  He  is  confined  by  law  within 
a  kind  of  economic  concentration  camp. 
The  legal  difficulties  put  in  the  way  of  the 
full  exercise  of  his  industrial  capacities  are 
both  the  source  of  his  poverty  and  of  his 
oppression.  He  cannot  own  land,  within 
the  Pale,  *  or  work  it;  but  he  must  live. 
Therefore,  he  is  compelled  to  exploit  those 
who  will  hate  him  all  the  more  on  account 
of  a  resourcefulness  which  conquers  some 
of  the  obstacles  purposely  placed  in  the  way 
of  his  livelihood.  His  faith  is  assailed  by 
almost  every  form  of  human  temptation,  in¬ 
cluding  the  terrorism  of  such  periodical 
crimes  as  those  perpetrated  a  few  weeks  ago. 
And  the  very  fidelity  which  enables  him  to 
resist  both  the  powers  of  proselytism  and  of 
persecution,  only  adds  one  more  prejudiced 
ground  to  the  many  which  appeal  against 
him  to  the  religious  side  of  an  autocratic 
regime  which  decrees  that  an  invulnerable 
heterodoxy  is  one  of  the  worst  of  crimes  in 
Russia. 


68 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


T'hG  Jgw  has  no  friend  outside  his  own 
race  in  Russia,  while  not  infrequently  those 
of  his  own  household  are  the  worst  pay¬ 
masters  of  his  talent  and  industry.  The 
peasant  dislikes  him  for  his  race,  his 
religion,  and  his  exploiting  propensities. 
The  artisan  and  labourer  in  urban  centres 
of  the  crowded  Pale  look  upon  him  a^s  an 
economic  black-leg,  because  he  is  compelled 
to  work  at  anything  for  the  wages  of  bare 
subsistence,  in  order  to  live.  He  is,  by  the 
cruel  decree  of  his  fate,  and  not  by  choice, 
the  cause  of  low  wages.  This  is  one  reason 
why  a  great  number  of  the  sanguinary 
rioters  at  Kishineff  were  Russian  and- 
Moldavian  workingmen. 

The  shop-keeper  and  petty  dealer  see  in 
their  Hebrew  rival  a  competitor  who  out¬ 
classes  them  in  all  the  dexterous  tricks  of 
trade,  and  w'ho  can  succeed  where  the  busi¬ 
ness  capacity  of  the  Slavonic  gentile  is 
wanting  in  perseverance  and  resource. 
Here  hatred  is  bom  of  a  sordid  jealousy. 

As  rich  merchant  and  banker  he  is  toler- 


THE  RUSSIAN  JEW 


69 


ated.  The  wealthy  Russian  Jew  is,  at 
present,  a  Russian  necessity.  Odessa,  one 
of  the  richest  cities  of  <the  Empire,  is  run  ” 
by  the  superior  abilities  of  the  proscribed 
race.  Its  commercial  prosperity  would  col¬ 
lapse  to-morrow  if  they  were  expelled;  just 
as  the  business  and  progress  of  Kishineft 
have  been  all  but  paralysed  by  the  outbreak 
against  them  at  Easter. 

Anti-Semitic  prejudices  grow  as  we  pro^ 
ceed  from  the  rivalries  of  economic  pursuits 
to  the  classes  and  interests  associated  with 
the  administration  of  the  Empire.  The 
policeman  knows  the  Jew  is  made  an  alien 
by  law,  and  that  the  necessity  he  is  under  to 
evade  the  legal  disabilities  to  which  he  is 
subject  renders  him  a  profitable  source  of 
blackmail.  Where  his  poverty  repels  the 
exercise  of  this  corruption,  the  guardian  of 
the  peace  looks  upon  the  Jew  with  all  the 
mixed  antipathy — racial,  religious,  and 
economic — of  the  superstitious,  uniformed 
Mujik. 

In  the  lower  and  middle  grades  of  the 


70 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


civil  service  the  Jew  is  feared  as  well  as 
disliked.  He  is  known  to  be  far  more  intel¬ 
lectual,  more  industrious,  and  more  capable 
than  the  average  Russian,  and  there  is  a 
dread  lest  employment  in  the  innumerable 
posts  of  a  vast  administration  should,  at 
some  future  period,  be  thrown  open  to  a  race 
so  versatile,  so  sober,  and  so  ambitious  to 
succeed.  In  every  Royal  School  or  Gymna¬ 
sium  to  which  a  Jewish  youth  is  admitted — 
the  number  must  never  exceed  10  per  cent, 
of  the  whole  attendance,  in  some  schools  not 
5  per  cent.—the  son  of  Abraham  is  certain  to 
eclipse  his  rivals,  and  to  walk  oft  with  what¬ 
ever  honours  are  to  be  won. 

I  have  already  indicated  the  feeling, 
candidly  expressed,  of  the  higher  branches 
of  the  public  service  on  the  subject  of  the 
Jew  as  a  possible  rival  in  that  department 
of  the  state.  An  equality  of  opportu¬ 
nity  would  mean  a  monopoly  of  posts  by 

sheer  force  of  mental  and  general  equip¬ 
ment. 

The  Russian  officer  is  not  averse  to  the 


THE  RUSSIAN  JEW 


71 


Jew  as  a  soldier,  but  be  must  never  be — a 
Russian  officer. 

Finally,  tbe  Government  of  Russia  looks 
upon  the  Jew  as  the  most  dangerous  of  dis¬ 
turbing  factors  in  the  rapid  development 
of  the  industrial  life  of  the  Empire,  and  as 
a  political  enemy  within  the  ambit  of  its 
most  vulnerable  western  frontier.  He  is 
believed  to  be  the  active  propagandist  of 
Socialism,  and  he  is  known  to  have  powerful 
political  and  financial  allies  among  the 
pressmen  and  financiers  of  France,  England, 
and  Germany — allies  who  can  strike  at 
Russia’s  financial  credit,  external  policies, 
and  moral  prestige,  in  retaliation  for  the 
legal  outlawry  of  their  race  within  the 
dominions  of  the  Tsar. 

Against  these  governmental,  religious, 
industrial,  social,  and  national  forces  of  a 
huge  empire  combined,  what  chance  has  a 
proscribed  race,  alienised  by  law,  of  obtain¬ 
ing  redress?  It  is  a  hopeless  struggle,  look 
at  it  how  we  may.  The  duties  and  obliga¬ 
tions  of  civilised  rule  may  be  put  before  the 


72 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


Russian  Government,  and  the  pleas  of  an 
enlightened  jurisprudence  advanced  in  be¬ 
half  of  the  Russian  Jew,  but  with  what 
result?  Russia  makes  answer,  “  These 
people  are  not  of  us,  any  more  than  the 
Ohinese  of  San  Francisco,  or  the  ten  mil¬ 
lions  of  emancipated  Negroes,  are  free 
citizens  of  the  United  States  Republic. 
They  are  a  danger  to  the  Empire  from 
within,  more  so  than  the  existence  of  the 
Boer  Republics  of  South  Africa  ever  was  a 
menace  to  the  prestige  of  the  British  Em¬ 
pire,  the  removal  of  which,  nevertheless,  re¬ 
quired  a  great  and  costly  war.  We  claim 
the  right  to  resort  to  our  own  measures,  as 
other  Powers  have  done,  as  France  is  doing 
to-day,  to  safeguard  the  peace  of  the  realm, 
and  to  minimise  the  risks  involved  in  having 
an  unfriendly  element,  composed  of  five  or 
SIX  millions  of  an  unpopular  race,  located 
where  a  German  or  an  Austrian  attack 
might  some  day  be  made  upon  our  Western 
frontier.  We  cannot  expect,  or  induce, 
other  countries  to  open  the  gates  of  emigra- 


THE  RUSSIAN  JEW 


73 


tion  to  these  undesirables,  but  we  will  not 
permit  any  Power  or  people  to  coerce  us  to 
admit  this  race  to  the  common  rights  of 
Russian  citizenship  or  nationality.’^ 

This  may  be  despotic,  irrational,  and  all 
the  rest,  but  it  is  the  answer  which  every 
external  attempt  to  nationalise  the  Semitic 
alien  will  obtain  from  the  Russian  Empire. 
The  voices  of  Maxime  Gorky,  and  of  Tolstoy, 
and  of  a  few  other  noble  spirits  to  the 
contrary  are  but  moral  foils  which  exhibit 
by  contrast  the  omnipotent  strength  of  the 
resisting  and  resistless  ruling  influences 
behind  the  Tsar;  military,  religious,  social, 
and  industrial ;  which  stand  remorseless 
and  irremovable  between  the  Russian  Jew 
and  justice  and  equality. 

Russia’s  point  of  view  must  be  understood 
if  she  is  to  be  rightly  judged  in  this  matter, 
and  if  the  friends  of  a  persecuted  people  are 
to  be  persuaded  to  concentrate  their  sym¬ 
pathetic  energies  upon  some  feasible  remedy 
for  an  intolerable  wrong.  Socialism  has, 
as  yet,  about  as  much  of  a  hold  and  of  a 


74 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


hope  in  Russia,  as  Protestantism  has  in 
Spain,  or  Catholicity  in  Turkey.  The  soil 
is  not  congenial;  but  the  propaganda  is  a 
most  serious  danger  which  the  Russian 
powers  that  be  fear  more  as  a  potential 
future  element  of  industrial  and  political 
agitation  than  as  a  present  trouble  to  the 
forces  of  law  and  order.  Socialism  is  like 
the  Jew,  an  unwelcome  intruder,  and  both 
are  inseparably  asisociated  in  the  ruling  and 
official  mind  of  the  Empire. 

Russians  industrial  development,  like  the 
extension  of  her  power  and  prestige,  must 
be  along  lines  selected  by  herself.  She 
wants  no  external  tutelage,  and  will  have 
no  outside  meddling  in  her  domestic  affairs. 
Nor,  is  she  taking  this  stand  out  of  any  un¬ 
willingness  to  see  labour  rightly  rewarded, 
or  from  any  desire  that  a  favoured  class  or 
protected  interest  shall  sweat  or  treat  un¬ 
justly  the  growing  industrial  population  of 
her  manufacturing  centres.  Any  such  im¬ 
putation  would  be  untrue  and  unfair. 
There  is  scarcely  a  practicable  reform  in 


THE  RUSSIAN  JEW 


75 


the  social  and  industrial  programme  of 
Trades-Unionism  which  some  department 
of  Russian  administration  is  not  trying  its 
best,  at  the  present  time,  to  put  into  opera¬ 
tion,  in  some  tentative  way,  for  the  benefit 
of  the  mill,  and  foundry,  and  general  work¬ 
shop  hands  of  Russia’s  manufacturing  ac¬ 
tivities  ; — old-age  pensions,  profit-sharing, 
sanitation  of  mills  and  mines,  healthy  hous¬ 
ing  of  workers,  even  to  the  copying  of  the 
Arheiterstadt  of  Mulhausen,  in  the  Cite 
oiivriere  of  Dago-Kertell.  But  there  shall 
be  no  Trades-Unionist  combination  in 
Russia  except  what  emanates  from  and  is 
sanctioned  by  a  paternal  government. 

In  many  respects  and  ways  Russian 
autocracy  is  ahead  of  constitutional  coun¬ 
tries  in  enlightened  efforts  to  solve  the  com¬ 
plex  labour  problem  of  our  day.  The 
manifold  evils  of  overcrowded  urban 
centres  are  recognised  and  guarded  against 
in  the  encouragement  of  rural  manufactur¬ 
ing  villages.  Plans  for  enabling  artisans 
to  acquire  the  ownership  of  their  homes  are 


76 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


the  work  of  Oommissioiis  and  Societies  sub¬ 
sidised  by  the  Government  for  this  special 
task.  There  are  apprenticeship  schools  for 
the  children  of  mechanics,  ''public  work¬ 
shops  for  the  unemployed  in  times  of  dis¬ 
tress,  and  other  progressive  schemes  having 
the  social  and  moral  betterment  of  the 
worker  in  view.  These  and  kindred  re¬ 
forms  are  engaging  the  serious  and  earnest 
attention  of  the  Tsar^s  ministerial  advisers. 

In  one  other  most  important  respect  the 
Russian  Government  is  setting  an  example 
in  beneficent  industrial  enterprise  which 
more  progressive  countries  might  follow 
with  marked  advantage  to  their  labouring 
classes.  This  is  the  national  encourage¬ 
ment  offered  to  the  "Koustari,’’  or  rural, 
industries.  These  play  an  essential  part 
in  the  national  economy  of  the  Russian  peo¬ 
ple.  They  help  to  keep  families  together, 
and  to  minimise  migratory  labour.  These 
cottage  industries  give  remunerative  em¬ 
ployment  during  slack  seasons  and  winter 
months  to  several  million  people,  and  yield 


THE  RUSSIAN  JEW 


77 


an  addition  to  the  general  wage  fund  of  the 
country  averaging  five  hundred  million 
roubles  a  year.  All  these  industries  have 
direct  economic  relation  to  the  greatest  of 
all  Russian  industries,  that  of  agriculture. 
They,  therefore,  play  a  doubly  profitable 
part  in  the  social  welfare  of  the  people,  in 
helping  to  maintain  a  due  economic  balance 
between  rural  and  urban  labour,  and  in 
upholding  the  primary  importance  of  land 
industries  to  the  physical  and  moral  health 
of  the  nation. 

Russia,  unlike  England,  recognises  the 
national  danger  of  physical  degeneracy 
through  overcrowded  manufacturing  cities. 
Knowing  how  the  prospect  of  better  wages 
in  these  centres  attracts  the  workers  of  the 
soil  to  the  employment  of  mills  and 
foundries,  she  sets  herself  the  task  of  en¬ 
couraging  the  growth  of  such  counter-in¬ 
dustries  as  will  tend  to  minimise  the  extent 
of  this  movement.  Not  alone  does  she  want 
to  remove  mills  from  the  unhealthy  environ¬ 
ment  of  crowded  towns  by  placing  them 


78 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


amidst  rural  surroundings,  she  also  wisely 
tries  to  add  to  the  necessarily  scant  money 
earnings  of  farmers’  families  the  profits 
of  the  Koustari  occupations,  the  better  to 
preserve  the  home  infiuence  and  the  healthy 
atmosphere  of  village  industrial  life  for  the 
general  benefit  of  the  people’s  physique  and 
to  the  great  moral  advantage  of  the  Kussian 
masses. 

All  this  is  necessary  to  be  understood  in 
order  to  comprehend  the  antipathy,  eco¬ 
nomic  and  political,  which  the  Kussian  Jew 
excites  in  the  official  and  the  general  Rus¬ 
sian  mind. 

And,  above  all,  this  one  additional  fact 
must,  in  like  manner,  be  grasped  in  any 
useful  discussion  of  the  problem  of  the 
Russian  Jew. 

The  enormous  development  of  the  indus¬ 
trial  resources  and  energies  of  Russia  is 
too  frequently  ignored  in  an  unfriendly  for¬ 
eign  press,  which  finds  space  and  specula¬ 
tion  only  for  the  external  policy  and  gen¬ 
erally  exaggerated  plans  of  the  Tsar’s  Gov- 


THE  RUSSIAN  JEW 


79 


ernment.  What  Russia  Is  accused  of  cov¬ 
eting  in  Manchuria,  or  of  devising  in  Persia, 
and  not  what  she  is  strenuously  and  rapidly 
achieving  in  the  sphere  of  her  vast  domestic 
activities,  exercises  the  critical  attention 
of  West-European  and  American  journal- 
isni.  And  yet,  the  wide  and  sure  and  ex¬ 
traordinary  progress  that  is  being  made  in 
the  economic  development  of  a  great  em¬ 
pire,  as  self-contained  in  its  measureless 
natural  resources  as  the  United  States,  and 
with  an  assured  domestic  market  for  most 
of  her  manufactured  products  in  a  popu¬ 
lation  of  fully  140,000,000 — growing  at  a 
rate  of  upwards  of  2,000,000  annually  out 
of  a  natural  increase — ought  to  be  a  subject 
of  infinitely  greater  concern  to  the  public 
thought  of  commercial  rivals  like  Great 
Britain  and  the  United  States— as  it  un¬ 
doubtedly  is  to  the  keener  sense  of  German 
competition — than  what  Russian  policy  may 
or  may  not  mean  in  its  diplomatic  trend  in 
the  Far  East. 

Russia  is  at  the  beginning  of  an  enor- 


80 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


mous  manufacturing  career.  Her  surplus 
urban  population  will  be  drawn  upon  for 
the  needs  of  her  mills  and  factories.  An 
artisan  class,  in  a  comparatiyely  new  sphere 
of  industrial  energy,  is  rapidly  growing, 
made  up  of  young  men  who  must  inevitably 
gather  new  ideas  of  social  life  among  the 
influences  of  associated  labour;  a  class 
to  be  recruited  from  an  uneducated  peas¬ 
antry,  susceptible  to  new  impressions  of 
capital  and  labour,  of  wages  and  economic 
rights,  of  citizenship  and  political  teach¬ 
ings,  and  of  the  contending  human  rivalries 
of  class  interests  for  wealth  and  influence 
and  power  in  the  rule  of  the  state. 

In  a  word,  the  government  of  a  country 
in  which  freedom  of  the  press  ife  limited, 
and  the  right  of  public  meeting  denied; 
where  no  Parliament,  or  Congress,  exists 
for  the  ventilation  of  theories,  the  discus¬ 
sion  of  reforms,  or  the  chances  of  legislative 
redress,  finds  itself  confronted  with  the 
problem  of  a  huge  working  class,  soon  to 
number  millions,  and  to  be  emancipated 


THE  RUSSIAN  JEW 


81 


from  peasant  ignorance;  a  class,  too,  which 
must  contribute  its  quota  of  strength  to 
Russia’s  enormous  army.  And  this  auto¬ 
cratic  guardian  of  an  Empire’s  destinies 
says :  The  enemy  of  my  household  is  the 
Jew.  I  have  treated  him  badly,  and  he 
naturally  resents  it.  He  retaliates  by 
preaching  Socialism  in  my  industrial  cen¬ 
tres.  He  is  in  alliance  with  the  avowed 
enemies  of  the  Empire  in  Western  Europe. 
For  all  these  reasons,  out  he  must  go !  Let 
him  be  off  to  any  country  whose  Consti¬ 
tution  may  admit  him  to  equal  citizenship 
with  people  who  are  ruled  by  other  systems 
and  laws  than  ours.  In  Russia  the  Jew  is 
both  a  domestic  and  an  Imperial  danger, 
and  it  is  our  duty  to  rid  ourselves  of  its 
cause.” 


CHAPTER  VI 


THE  ZIONIST  SOLUTION 

NO  truer  general  statement  of  the  case 
of  the  Russian  Jew,  or  nobler  appeal 
to  enlightened  humanity  in  his  behalf,  has 
been  made  in  our  time  than  by  Cardinal 
Manning,  in  a  letter  addressed  to  a  London 
meeting  in  December,  1890.  Every  word 
of  this  superbly  Christian  epistle  is  as  true 
and  as  applicable  to-day  as  it  was  thirteen 
years  ago,  and  I  quote  the  concluding  sen¬ 
tences  of  it  here  as  being  both  a  powerful 
argument  in  behalf  of  an  oppressed  people, 
and  as  a  testimony  to  the  liberty-loving 
spirit  of  a  Cardinal  of  the  Catholic  Church : 

Six  millions  of  men  in  Russia  are  so 
hemmed  in  and  hedged  about  by  penal  laws 
as  to  residence,  and  food,  and  education, 
and  property,  and  trade,  and  military  ser¬ 
vice,  and  domiciliary  visits,  and  police  in- 

82 


THE  RUSSIAN  JEW 


83 


spection  as  to  justify  the  words,  that  ‘  no 
Jew  can  earn  a  livelihood/  and  that  ^they 
are  watched  as  criminals/  The  narratives 
before  us  may  be  highly  coloured,  they  may 
be  overcharged;  but,  all  deductions  made, 
they  show  both  a  violent  and  a  refined  in¬ 
justice,  which  is  perpetually  as  ‘  iron  enter¬ 
ing  the  soul/ 

And,  further,  when  the  cry  of  such'  a 
multitude  of  suffering  is  wafted  through 
the  commonwealth  of  Europe,  it  is  surely 
a  part  of  the  comity  of  nations  that  we 
should,  with  all  due  respect,  make  known 
what  we  have  heard,  in  the  confidence  thait, 
if  things  be  so,  the  first  to  seek  out  and 
to  treat  such  evils  would  be  the  supreme 
authority  of  the  Realm  from  whence  those 
wailing  voices  came. 

We  show  no  disrespect  in  believing  that 
what  reaches  our  ears  may  not  have  reached 
the  ears  of  those  who  are  most  highly  ex¬ 
alted.  Knowledge  travels  more  readily  on 
lower  levels,  and  often  does  not  ascend  to 
the  highest  regions;  the  highest  are,  as  a 


84 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


rule,  the  last  to  know  the  excesses  and  mal¬ 
practices  of  their  local  authorities.  We, 
therefore,  with  all  due  reverence,  petition 
the  Imperial  Ruler  of  all  the  Russias  to  take 
account  of  all  the  Governors  of  the  Jewish 
Pale;  and  even  this  we  should  not  venture 
to  do,  if  the  sufferings  alleged  were  not  of 
such  a  kind  and  of  such  an  extent  as  to 
violate  the  great  and  primary  laws  of  hu¬ 
man  society.  On  this  broad  and  solid  base 
of  natural  law  the  jurisprudence  of  Euro¬ 
pean  civilisation  rests.  The  public  moral 
sense  of  all  nations  is  created  and  sustained 
by  participation  in  this  universal  common 
law;  when  this  is  anywhere  broken,  or 
'  wounded,  it  is  not  only  sympathy  but  civi¬ 
lisation  that  has  the  privilege  of  respectful 
remonstrance. 

“  I  am  well  aware  of  the  counter  allega¬ 
tions,  not  only  of  the  anti-Semitic  press, 
but  of  guarded  and  responsible  adversaries ; 
nevertheless,  it  is  certain  that  races  are  as 
they  are  treated.  How  can  citizens  who 
are  denied  the  rights  of  naturalisation  be 


THE  RUSSIAN  JEW 


85 


patriotic?  How  can  men,  who  are  only  al¬ 
lowed  to  breathe  the  air,  but  not  to  own 
the  soil  under  their  feet,  to  eat  only  a  food 
that  is  doubly  taxed,  to  be  slain  in  war,  but 
never  to  command — ^how  shall  such  a  home¬ 
less,  an  exiled  race  live  the  life  of  the 
people  among  whom  they  are  despised,  or 
love  the  land  which  disowns  them? 

It  would  seem  to  me  that  if  such  were 
the  sufferings  of  any  nation,  even  in  Cen¬ 
tral  Africa,  we  should  be  not  only  justified, 
but  called  on,  to  intervene.  How  much 
more,  then,  in  behalf  of  a  race  who,  in  their 
past  and  their  present  and  their  future, 
demand  of  us  an  exceptional  reverence;  a 
race  with  a  sacred  history  of  nearly  four 
thousand  years ;  a  present  without  parallel ; , 
dispersed  in  all  lands,  with  an  imperishable 
personal  identity,  isolated  and  changeless, 
greatly  afilicted,  without  home  or  father- 
land  ;  visibly  reserved  for  a  future  of  signal 
mercy. 

“  Into  this  I  will  not  enter  further  than 
to  say  that  any  man  who  does  not  believe  in 


86 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


their  future  must  be  a  careless  reader,  not 
only  of  the  old  Jewish  Scriptures,  but  even 
of  our  own.  It  is  not  our  duty  to  add  to 

their  afflictions,  nor  to  look  on  unmoved, 

/ 

and  to  keep  the  garments  when  others  stone 

them. 

If  we  know  the  mind  of  our  Master 
who  prayed  for  them  in  His  last  hour,  we 
owe  to  them  both  the  justice  of  the  Old  Law 
and  the  charity  of  the  New.” 

I  have  come  from  a  journey  through  the 
Jewish  Pale,  a  convinced  believer  in  the 
remedy  of  Zionism.  I  failed  to  see  any 
other  that  can  offer  an  equal  hope  of  suc¬ 
cess.  It  is  a  necessity  of  the  actual  situa¬ 
tion,  and  faces  the  growing  perils  of  the 
position  of  the  Russian  Jew  with  a  cour¬ 
ageous  plan  of  repatriation.  Hope  for  par¬ 
tial  or  ultimate  emancipation  in  Russia 
there  is  none.  Other  countries  cannot  be 
expected  to  relieve  Russia  of  the  unhappy 
victims  of  oppression  and  poverty.  Where, 

then,  are  they  to  go? 

Russia  has  a  direct  responsibility  in  their 


THE  RUSSIAN  JEW 


87 


impoverishment  and  discontent,  and  this 
fact  demands  at  her  hands  every  help  which 
the  Zionist  plan  requires  in  its  execution, 
financiaU  co-operation  with  the  wealthy 
Jews  of  Christendom  in  providing  the  cost 
of  emigration,  the  purchase  of  suitable  land 
in  Palestine,  and  in  obtaining  the  necessary 
rights  of  settlement  and  guarantee  of  pro¬ 
tection  from  the  Turkish  Government.  This 
latter  provision  is  generally  believed  to  be 
an  affair  of  money,  to  be  arranged  with  the 
Sultan;  but,  in  any  case,  the  moral  help  of 
other  great  Powers  would  not  be  refused  in 
such  a  chivalrous,  humane  enterprise  when 
once  the  influential  Jews  of  Europe  and 
America  made  it,  as  they  easily  could  do, 
an  appeal  for  aissistance  to  the  sense  of  jus¬ 
tice  and  of  repiaration  of  the  nations  of 
Christendom. 

It  is  some  eighteen  years  since  I  rode 
from  Mount  Carmel  to  Nazareth,  thence  to 
Tiberias,  and  back  through  the  beautiful 
plain  of  Jezreel,  down  to  Nablus  in  Sa¬ 
maria  on  the  way  to  Jerusalem.  Jericho, 


88 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


the  wilds  of  Judea,  the  country  to  the  west, 
across  the  pastoral  lands  of  Sharon,  were 
also  visited.  I  found  the  German  Templer 
colonies  at  Haifa,  Nablus,  and  Sarona 
wearing  all  the  appearance  of  comfortable 
clusters  of  garden  and  farming  homesteads. 
The  J ews  of  Bessarabia  are  as  sober  and  as 

9 

industrious  and,  at  least,  as  intelligent  as 
these  German  emigrants.  They  have  pro¬ 
gressed  in  South  Kussia  when  permitted  to 
cultivate  the  land.  Why  should  they  not  be 
able  to  grow  grain  in  Galilee,  fruit  and 
olives  in  Samaria,  meat  in  the  mountains 
of  Judea,  and  wine  and  other  products  con¬ 
genial  to  the  soil  and  climate  in  the  vale  of 
Sharon,  and  elsewhere,  in  a  land  which 
once  flowed  rich  with  milk  and  honey? 

Christendom  is  prejudiced  against  this 
race  because  its  sons  are  generally  non-pro¬ 
ducers  of  wealth,  and  mere  exploiters  of  the 
fruits  and  necessities  of  direct  industry. 
This  is  largely,  but  by  no  means  wholly, 
true,  while  the  taunt  bears  with  it  the  spirit 
of  Pharisaical  virtue  unconscious  of  self- 


THE  RUSSIAN  JEW 


89 


accusation.  Twenty  per  cent,  of  the  Jews 
of  Bessarabia  are  artisans  and  labourers 
working  for  wages.  But,  if  the  race  gen¬ 
erally  are  exploiters  and  extortioners,  who 
made  them  so?  Are  not  historical  condi¬ 
tions  and  centuries  of  deliberate  oppression 
in  every  Christian  land  (Ireland  honour¬ 
ably  excepted)  answerable  for  the  Hebrew 
predilection  to  profit-seeking  by  other  than 
the  methods  of  immediate  production? 
And  are  the  Gentiles  of  the  lofty  moral 
school  of  critics  so  much  above  the  doctrine 
and  practice  of  the  commercial  greed  of 
buying  in  the  cheapest,  and  selling  in  the 
dearest,  market?  Expedients  of  every 
kind  and  shade, writes  Herbert  Spencer 
( Philosophical  Essays,”  vol.  ii.,  on  Com¬ 
mercial  Morality  ”),  from  innocent  decep¬ 
tion  to  anything  you  please,  excepting  open 
robbery,  prevail  even  in  the  higher  grades 
of  the  commercial  world.  Innumerable 
frauds,  untruth,  both  in  words  and  in  prin¬ 
ciples  of  business,  and  carefully  devised  sub¬ 
terfuges  are  generally  in  vogue,  while  many 


90 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


of  these  have  become  established  as  com¬ 
mercial  usages.’’ 

It  is  on  record  somewhere  that  no  Jew 
has  ever  become  a  millionaire  in  Scotland 
or  in  the  United  States.  His  powers  of 
dextrous  money-mongering  are  blunted  in 
some  pronounced  Christian  lands  by  meth¬ 
ods  as  expert  and  morals  as  accommodating 
as  his  own.  But,  whatever  ground  there 
may  be  for  the  somewhat  general  feeling 
prevailing  against  the  Hebrew  race  for  its 
financial  unscrupulousness  ought  to  make 
for  and  not  against  the  Zionist  movement, 
which  seeks  to  find  a  place  of  refuge  and  of 
safety  for  those  whose  present  sufierings 
and  unhappy  prospects  appeal  to  the  best 
side  of  our  common  humanity. 

Cardinal  Manning’s  noble  words,  quoted 
in  support  of  this  humble  advocacy  of  the 
cause  of  an  oppressed  people,  will  surely 
find  a  direct  response  in  every  kindly  heart 
and  head  which  may  reflect  upon  the  story 
and  the  sufferings  of  the  Russian  Jew. 


PART  II 

THE  KISHINEFF.  MASSACRES 

CHAPTER  VII 
I.  ORIGIN  AND  AGENCY 

ISHINEPP  is  the  capital  of  Bes- 
sarabia,,  -the  seat  of  its  government, 
and  'the  chief  centre  of  its  trading  industry. 
It  has  a  present  population  of  130,000,  of  a 
mixed  ethnological  community.  The  Rus¬ 
sians  number  about  8000  5  the  Moldavians, 
50,000;  the  Jews,  50,000,  with  Bulgarians, 
Serbs,  Greeks,  Macedonians,  and  Germans 
accounting  for  the  balance. 

In  the  time  of  the  Romans,  Bessarabia 
formed  part  of  the  Imperial  colony  known 
as  Dacia,  and  the  Moldavian  peasantry, 
who  form  the  greater  part  of  its  present 
population,  are  said  to  be  descendants  of 

Roman  undesirables  who  were  forcibly 

91 


92 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


exiled  to  the  Balkan  regions.  From  thence 
they  emigrated,  in  time,  to  the  rich  lands 
lying  west  of  the  Dniester.  The  succession 
of  conquering  and  colonising  peoples  who 
fought  for  the  possession  of  this  most  fruit¬ 
ful  region  is  historically  bewildering.  Cymri 
and  Scythians,  Greeks  and  Getee,  Romans 
and  Goths,  Huns  and  Avars,  Bulgars  and 
Slavonians;  until,  in  the  seventh  century, 
the  Bessi  arrived,  and  gave  the  country  its 
name  of  Bessarabia.’^  Then  came,  in  due 
course,  Ugrians,  Kumans,  Polovtzians,  and 
Mongolians.  In  the  Middle  Ages  the  Re¬ 
public  of  Genoa  founded  colonies  along  the 
Dniester,  which  in  turn  gave  way  to  an  in¬ 
vasion  of  Turks.  During  the  eighteenth 
century  Russian  power  asserted  itself  in  the 
land,  and  portions  of  the  southern  provinces 
which  belonged  to  Turkey  were,  in  our  own 
time,  ceded  to  the  great  Empire,  thus  com¬ 
pleting  Russian  possession  of  the  most 
fought-for  country  embraced  within  the 
wide  dominions  of  the  Tsars. 

Thirty  years  ago  Kishineff  was  on  a  level 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  93 


wjth  an  average  Turkish  town.  According 
to  its  present  Mayor,  M.  Karl  Schmidt,  the 
city  owes  its  rapid  rise  and  prosperity,  and 
its  present  flourishing  trade,  solely  to  the 
Jews.  They  built  up  its  commerce,  organ¬ 
ised  its  banks,  developed  its  general  busi¬ 
ness,  and  made  it  the  handsome,  thriving 
city  it  is  to-day. 

The  country  around  the  city  is  a  great 
wine-growing  region,  and  the  Moldavian 
peasants  are  the  chief  producers  of  this 
most  marketable  commodity.  They  are  not 
an  intelligent  race,  and  are  even  more  su¬ 
perstitious,  if  possible,  than  the  average 
Russian  Mujik.  They  do  not  migrate  from 
their  villages  in  search  of  labour,  like  Rus¬ 
sian  workers  in  the  central  provinces.  Their 
spare  time  is  spent  in  eating  sunflower 
seeds,  and  in  drinking  vodka  during  the 
winter  months. 

The  economic  relations  between  these 
Moldavian  wine-growers  and  the  Jews  of 
Kishineff  are  most  intimate.  They  have 
no  business  capacity  whatever,  and  they  dis- 


94 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


pose  of  their  produce  to  the  Jew  brokers 
and  dealers,  who  make,  at  least,  a  ten  per 
cent,  profit  on  such  transactions. 

These  intimate  trading  connections  have 
not  led,  as  recently  alleged,  to  any  marked 
ill-feeling  against  the  intermediaries; 
though  it  is  only  natural  to  assume  that 
the  profits  of  the  skilled  exploiter  are  not 
always  a  source  of  satisfaction  to  the  mind 
of  the  peasant  producer.  What  I  was  as¬ 
sured  of,  in  this  connection,  from  all 
sources  of  information  sought  by  me  in 
Kishineff,  was  that  the  origin  of  the 
outbreak  at  Easter  was  not,  in  any 
sense,  traceable  to  these  dealings  between 
the  Jew  merchants  and  brokers  of  the 
city  and  the  surrounding  Moldavian 
farmers. 

The  genesis  of  the  recent  massacres  is  to 
be  found  in  the  special  legislation  which 
gives  the  Jew  the  mockery  of  civil  rights 
within  a  pale  of  legal  domicile.  There  are, 
at  least,  a  hundred  laws,  ordinances,  and 
special  regulations  having  for  object  the 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  95 


coercing  of  him  in  all  his  religious,  soeial, 
and  industrial  rights;  even  within  this  Pale 
of  Settlement.*  He  is  crowded  into  urban 
centres  and  denied',  under  penalties,  access 
to  where  conditions  of  work  and  location 
might  relieve  him  of  his  poverty  and 
wretched  home.  Fines  are  levied  upon  him 
for  infringements  of  these  coercive  regula¬ 
tions,  and  this  fact  induces  him’  to  circum¬ 
vent  such  restrictive  measures,  while  it  ap¬ 
peals  also  to  the  police  to  help  him  to  do 
so — for  a  consideration. 

The  first  serious  trouble  experienced  by 
the  Jews  of  Bessarabia  began  about  eight 
years  ago.  A  sous-prefect  of  police,  named 
Von  Oglio,  appointed  in  the  Beltzy  district 
by  the  present  Vice-Governor,  Ostro- 
goff,  harassed  the  Jews  by  exactions  and 
blackmail  until  they  ''  struck  ’’  against  be¬ 
ing  further  bled  in  this  manner.  He  retal¬ 
iated  as  follows: 

On  the  Hebrew  festival  of  Yom  Kippur, 

one  of  the  most  solemn  ceremonies  of  the 

*See  Appendix 


96 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


year,  Von  Oglio  entered  the  local  syna¬ 
gogue,  seized  the  Torah,  or  sacred  writing, 
flung  it  on  the  floor,  ordered  a  policeman 
to  pick  it  up,  to  seal  it,  and  then  had  it  con¬ 
veyed  to — the  local  prison!  He  next  ex¬ 
pelled  the  small  congregation,  and  placed 
his  seal  upon  the  lock  of  the  place  of  wor¬ 
ship. 

He  then  applied  the  May  Laws  in  all 
their  rigour,  and  forced  all  who  had  not 
special  permits  to  leave  the  town,  even  men 
who  had  lived  there  in  peace  for  thirty 
years;  taking  proceedings  against  them 
under  circumstances  which  led  to  the  death 
or  injury  of  their  cattle  and  the  ruin  of 
their  crops.  This  conduct  on  the  part  of  the 
local  head  of  the  police  excited  a  corre¬ 
sponding  feeling  of  hostility  among  the 
local  peasants.  They  saw  the  guardians  of 
the  law  ill-treating  those  whom  they  were 
supposed  to  protect,  and  they  followed  the 
example  thus  set  them. 

Suits  for  reparation  and  damages  were 
brought  by  some  of  the  wealthier  victims  of 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  97 


this  police  tyranny,  but  no  redress  was  ob¬ 
tained.  Von  Oglio  was  removed,  without 
degradation  or  punishment,  to  another  dis¬ 
trict,  and  no  further  steps  were  taken  by 
the  authorities. 

The  chief  instigator  of  the  recent  massa¬ 
cres  now  appeared  on  the  scene.  Up  to 
1894  the  only  paper  in  the  province  of  Bes¬ 
sarabia  was  the  Bessarabsky  Yiestnik, 
a  journal  of  a  moribund  existence.  In  this 
year  one  Pavolachi  Kroushevan,  of  Mol¬ 
davian  origin,  acquired  the  dying  sheet,  and 
amalgamated  it  mth  a  new  daily  paper, 
the  Bessarabetz.  The  Vice-Governor,  Os- 
trogoff,  was  press  censor,  in  virtue  of  his 
higher  post,  and  he  extended  his  patronage 
to  KishinetUs  only  daily  organ  in  the  most 
marked  manner. 

Kroushevan  commenced  at  once  a  vicious 
anti-Semitic  campaign.  He  singled  out  for 
special  attack  municipal  offices  in  which 
Jews  were  employed  as  clerks  and  in  other 
capacities,,  and  demanded  that  the  hated 
Hebrews  should  be  driven  out  to  make 


98 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


room  for  Christians.  This  was  done.  Pop¬ 
ular  feeling  was  worked  up  in  this  manner 
to  such  a  heat  that  the  paper  became  the 
dominating  force  in  the  public  life  of  the 
city.  It  was  the  only  paper  read  in  Kishi- 
neff.  Its  circulation  reached  20,000,  and 
its  articles  against  the  Jews  were  directly 
addressed  to  the  police,  soldiers,  working¬ 
men,  Seminarists  (Kishineff  possesses  half- 
a-dozen  Koyal  and  Ecclesiastical  Colleges, 
Gymnasiums,  and  High  Schools),  and  to  all 
the  lower  employes  of  the  Governor’s,  Post 
Office,  Telegraph,  and  other  public  depart¬ 
ments. 

From  fiery  denunciation  the  Editor  pro¬ 
gressed  to  deliberate  incitations  to  violence. 
Articles  headed  Death  to  the  Jews!” — 
Crusade  against  the  Hated  Kace!” — 
Down  with  the  Disseminators  of  Social¬ 
ism  !  ”  followed  each  other,  while  Krou- 
shevan  organised  a  society  under  thepatron- 
age  of  his  paper,  in  which  the  most  rabid  of 
his  pupils  in  the  anti-Semitic  war  were  en¬ 
rolled. 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  99 


All  this  was  ostentatiously  tolerated  by 
the  present  Vice-Governor,  Ostrogoff. 

Kroushevan  got  into  financial  difftculties 
a  few  months  ago,  and  removed  to  St.  Pe¬ 
tersburg,  leaving  the  paper  in  charge  of  the 
deputy-editor,  but  continuing  himself  as 
directing  head  of  the  staff.  Its  ferocious 
anti- Jewish  spirit  and  propaganda  were  in 
no  way  abated  by  this  arrangement. 

This  brings  us  down,  in  the  matter  of 
time,  to  a  few  weeks  before  the  recent  mas¬ 
sacres. 

There  next  happened  two  evente  that 
gave  the  BessaraheU  a  match  with  which  to 
explode  the  mine  of  popular  fury  it  had  been 
building  in  the  popular  mind  for  four  years. 
One  was  a  murder  of  a  boy  at  a  village  south 
of  Kishineff,  called  Doubossar;  and  the 
other  the  suicide  of  a  girl  within  the  city 
itself.  These  were  at  once  seized  upon  by 
the  Kroushevan  organ  as  proofs  that 
they  were  instances  of  Semitic  ritual  mur¬ 
der  !  They  were  deliberately  declared  to  be 
cases  of  the  sacrifice  of  Christian  blood  in 


100 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


the  performance  of  Hebrew  rites  at  Pass- 
over!  Steps  were  taken  at  once  to  put  the 
true  facts  before  the  people,  in  public  in¬ 
quests  and  declarations;  but  the  match  had 
already  ignited  the  end  of  the  Bessara- 
hetz  fuse,  and  those  who  were  resolved  to 
strike  terror  into  the  Socialist  Jews  ”  of 
Bessarabia  and  Southwestern  Kussia  paid 
no  heed  to  the  documents  and  evidence 
which  told  the  truth  about  the  Doubossar 
boy’s  "death  and  the  girl  who  took  poison 
and  who  passed  away  in  the  Jewish  Hospital 
in  Kishineff.  The  plot  was  ripe  for  execu¬ 
tion,  and  the  Paischal  time,  associated  by  the 
atrocious  legend  with  the  kidnapping  and 
killing  of  Christian  children,  was  fixed 
upon  for  action. 


CHAPTEE  VIII 

II.  LETTERS  FROM  KISHINEFF  * 

TO  arrive  at  definite  conclusions  as  to 
the  immediate  and  the  contributory 
causes  of  the  sanguinary  outrages  perpe¬ 
trated  upon  the  Jews  of  Kishineff  on  the 
19th  and  20th  of  April,  was  a  tedious  and 
painful  process,  beset  with  innumerable 
difficulties.  To  try  to  find  the  truth  amidst 
a  mass  of  confiicting  testimony,  where  mur¬ 
der  and  rape  and  rapine  are  charged  against 
one  side,  and  where  the  actual  perpetrators 
of  these  deeds  are  supposed  to  be  all  in 
prison  awaiting  some  form  of  trial,  would 

■’^These  letters  are  republished  by  the  willing  permission 
of  Mr.  W.  R.  Hearst,  for  whose  papers  they  were  written 
from  Kishineff  and  elsewhere.  They  have,  of  course,  un¬ 
dergone  a  necessary  revision. 

It  is  believed  that  by  including  these  letters  as  they  were 
originally  written,  with  only  such  changes  as  were  neces¬ 
sary  to  a  permanent  form,  a  more  vivid  realisation  of  the 
scenes  of  the  tragedy  has  been  afforded  than  would  have 
been  possible  if  their  facts  alone  had  been  incorporated 
with  the  body  of  the  narrative. 

101 


102 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


be  a  formidable  task  even  where  the  law 
^  and  popular  feeling  were  on  the  side  of  jus¬ 
tice.  But  in  a  city  where  the  injured  class 
are  placed  almost  beyond  the  protection  of 
the  law  of  the  land,  and  where  public  pas¬ 
sion  is  alike  the  author  of  outrage  and  the 
apologist  of  partisan  officials,  it  is  neces¬ 
sarily  much  more  difficult  for  the  searcher 
after  unbiassed  evidence  to  secure  the  object 
of  his  quest. 

Disregarding  entirely  the  accounts  which 
have  been  published  in  the  Russian  and 
foreign  press,  I  adopted  the  following 
means  of  reaching  something  approximat¬ 
ing  to  the  real  facts  as  to  the  outrages; 
their  instigators,  cause,  and  extent,  and 
the  measure  of  representative  Russian  feel¬ 
ing  in  relation  thereto : 

On  arriving  at  Odessa  I  interviewed 
Count  Schouvaloff,  the  retiring  Civil  Gov¬ 
ernor  of  South  Russia,  and  I  reproduce 
from  memory  (not  having  taken  notes  of 
the  conversation)  what  he  was  courteous 
enough  to  say.  I  also  obtained  expressions 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  103 


of  opinion  from  Russian  and  other  mer¬ 
chants  in  Odessa  upon  anti- Jewish  feeling 
in  South  Russia;  and  these  views,  frankly 
biassed  as  they  were,  will  speak  for  a  very 
large  class  of  Russian  and  of  resident  for¬ 
eign  Christian  opinion  about  the  Jews  and 
their  racial  and  commercial  character,  as 
developed  in  this  country. 

Immediately  upon  reaching  Kishineff,  I 
called  upon  the  responsible  leaders  of  the 
Jews  to  whom  I  carried  letters  of  introduc¬ 
tion  from  London,  Paris,  and  New  York. 
They  are  prominent  citizens,  and  are 
largely  of  the  medical  profession.  I  ob¬ 
tained  from  them  and  others,  including  the 
three  Rabbis  of  the  city,  a  very  copious 
statement  of  all  that  occurred  there  on  the 
19th  and  20th  of  last  month. 

Resolved  to  compare  this  eco  parte  testi¬ 
mony  with  such  Russian  evidence  as  might 
be  least  tainted  with  anti-Semitic  prejudice 
in  this  now  somewhat  demoralised  place, 
I  solicited  and  secured  interviews  with  two 
Christian  doctors  of  Russian  blood;  also 


104 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


with  one  of  the  highest  civil  functionaries 
in  the  district,  who  is  a  noble  of  great 
wealth,  of  unique  local  influence,  whose 
name  I  am  not  permitted  to  use,  but  for 
whose  hona  fides  I  can  absolutely  vouch; 
and,  in  addition,  I  was  privileged  to  hold 
fully  an  hour^s  conversation  on  the  subject 
of  the  riots  and  outrages  with  M.  Karl 
Schmidt,  who  has  been  Mayor  of  the  city 
for  the  last  twenty-five  years  without  inter¬ 
ruption;  the  strongest  possible  evidence  to 
his  popularity  vdth  all  classes  of  his  fellow- 
citizens,  and  to  his  worth  and  capacity  as 
a  Russian  municipal  ruler. 

I  then  met  by  appointment  in  the  Jewish 
Hospital  all  the  medical  men,  Jews,  who 
had  professionally  attended  to  the  persons 
brought  there  during  and  after  the  riots, 
who  could  speak  as  to  the  number  of  killed 
and  wounded,  and  the  extent  of  the  injuries 
inflicted  upon  the  unfortunate  victims  of 
the  mob’s  fury.  The  statements  made  to 
me  by  these  doctors  I  repeated  to  the  two 
Russian  doctors  I  have  already  referred  to, 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  105 


and  I  have  noted  down  their  comments  upon 
the  accounts  given  me  by  their  Hebrew  med¬ 
ical  confreres. 

My  next  step  was  to  visit  the  scenes  of 
outrage  in  the  city,  and  in  the  Skulanska 
Rogatka  district,  where  the  most  atrocious 
of  the  crimes  were  committed,  and  to  ob¬ 
tain  from  the  living  witnesses  of  the  out¬ 
rages  an  account  of  what  they  saw  and  ex¬ 
perienced,  some  of  them  from  women  and 
girls  who  went  through  the  saturnalia  of 
ruffianism  as  victims  of  outrage  and  of  rape. 

From  these  tales  of  revolting  deeds  I  pro^ 
ceeded  to  the  Jewish  Cemetery,  where  I  saw 
and  counted  the  forty-four  newly  made 
graves  of  the  massacred  men,  women,  and 
children,  whose  freshly  turned  mounds 
stand  there  to-day  with  their  simple  He¬ 
brew  wooden  marks  of  identity,  as  an  ap¬ 
peal  to  the  God  alike  of  Christian  and  of 
Jew  against  deeds  done  in  the  pretended 
name  of  religion  which  might  even  shame 
devils  to  perpetrate. 

I  have  taken  pictures  of  these  graves,  of 


106 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


the  shed  in  which  the  young  girl  of  thirteen 
was  assaulted,  and  killed  with  four  men, 

of  groups  of  little  girls  and  women  who 

•  ^ 

passed  through  the  two  nights  of  horror 
in  the  quarter  where  the  Moldavian  fiends 
committed  the  worst  deeds,  and  of  houses 
in  which  numerous  murders  were  com¬ 
mitted. 

Knowing  how  unlikely  it  would  be  for 
me,  or  for  any  man,  to  obtain  from  modest 

t 

maidens  and  respectable  married  women 
any  account,  or  even  admission,  of  their 
having  been  violated,  I  sought  the  Rabbis 
of  the  city,  and  got  from  them  and  from 
some  of  the  victims  whom  I  met  there  par¬ 
ticulars  of  the  outrages  to  which  they  and 
others  were  subjected.  These  will,  as  far 
as  the  subject  can  permit  it,  be  dealt  with  in 
subsequent  letters. 

Let  me  to  this  extent  forestall  what  I 
shall  have  to  say  about  the  violation  of 
women.  All  the  worst  of  these  crimes  were 
the  work  of  Moldavians,  and  not  of  Rus¬ 
sians,  This,  I  am  convinced,  is  absolutely 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  107 


true.  Many  of  these  Moldavians  are  de¬ 
scended  from  the  colony  of  convicts  and 
criminals  founded  by  Pagan  Rome  in  the 
country  now  known  as  Roumania;  and  the 
several  centuries’  experience  by  the  race  of 
Turkish  rule,  before  being  inflicted  as  sub¬ 
jects  upon  more  civilised  governments,  has 
not  morally  improved  the  original  taint  in 
the  blood  of  their  present-day  representa¬ 
tives. 

Two  letters,*  one  signed  by  Count  Tol¬ 
stoy  and  the  other  from  Maxime  Gorky,  ad¬ 
dressed  to  the  committee  in  charge  of  the 
labour  of  relief  in  Kishineff,  express  the 
hateful  feeling  of  indignation  and  of  ab¬ 
horrence  with  which  the  cultured  Russian 
mind  looks  upon  these  revolting  deeds  of 
mediseval  Savagery  in  our  day. 

Letter  I 

Kishineff,  May  21st. 

The  first  survey  of  the  situation  here  sat¬ 
isfies  me  there  is  no  likelihood  of  any 

*  See  Appendix. 


108 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


further  serious  outbreak  for  the  present. 
The  military  precautions  seem  fully  ade¬ 
quate  to  the  task  of  dealing  with  any  emer¬ 
gency. 

The  Jews,  however,  are  still  terror- 
stricken,  and  in  fear  of  renewed  violence. 
Wealthy  families  have  fled  the  city,  but  the 
vast  mass  of  the  Hebrew  community,  num¬ 
bering  fully  flfty  thousand  souls,  are  too 
poor  to  purchase  the  means  of  seeking  pro¬ 
tection  in  flight. 

All  the  Russians  I  have  met,  from  Odessa 
to  this  city,  condemn  the  abominable  acts 
of  the  anti-Semitic  mobs  as  strongly  as 
other  people. 

The  true  origin  of  the  massacres  will  need 
patient  and  careful  inquiry,  but  it  can  in  a 
general  way  be  put  down  to  combined  racial, 
economic,  and  other  factors,  inflamed  by 
violent  incitations  of  the  local  anti-Jewish 
press. 

The  latest  list  of  the  killed  and  wounded, 
and  accounts  of  looting  and  destruction, 
gives  these  flgures :  Killed,  44 ;  badly 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  109 


wounded,  83;  injured,  500.  Houses  wrecked, 
700;  shops  and  small  stores  looted  and 
damaged,  600 ;  2000  families  are  said  to  be 
ruined  in  their  business  and  employment, 
and  10,000  people  require  relief. 

The  wealthy  Jews  of  the  City  and  Pale 
have  subscribed  about  forty-five  thousand 
dollars,  while  donations  from  Germany, 
France,  England,  ajnd  the  United  States 
amount,  so  far,  to  some  thirty  thousand  dol¬ 
lars  more. 

All  the  vengeance  of  the  mobs  seems  to 
have  been  directed  against  the  very  poorest 
of  the  Jews.  Shops  were  only  looted,  but 
artisans  were  killed. 

Much  greater  help  than  that  already 
received  will  be  required  to  prevent  starva¬ 
tion. 

Letter  II 

Kishinefp,  May  25tK. 

During  a  brief  halt  in  the  South  Rus¬ 
sian  capital,  Odessa,  I  availed  myself  of 
an  opportunity  of  visiting  the  retiring  Civil 


110 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


Governor,  Lieutenant  General  Count  P. 
P.  Schouvaloff,  elder  son  of  Count  Paul 

I 

Schouvaloff,  formerly  Russian  Ambassador 
at  Berlin,  and  subsequently  the  mo-st  pop¬ 
ular  Viceroy  of  Poland  who  reigned  in 
Warsaw  since  the  stormy  days  of  1863.  The 
Count  received  me  with  courtesy  and  affa¬ 
bility  at  his  private  palace,  on  the  Nicolai 
Boulevard.  His  Excellency  had,  he  in¬ 
formed  me,  been  abroad  during  the  last  two 
months,  and  had  only  just  returned  to  take 
adieux  of  the  local  officials  and  citizens  of 
Odessa  before  assuming  the  functions  of  his 
new  post  in  the  Ministry  of  the  Interior. 
Had  he  been  in  Odessa  during  the  terrible 
events  in  Kishineff  he  would,  ew-offtcio^ 
have  been  in  possession  of  intimate  knowl¬ 
edge  of  the  tragic  occurrences,  upon  which 
he  should  have  had  no  hesitation,  he  was 
good  enough  to  say,  to  have  given  me  the 
frank  expression  of  his  views.  As  it  was, 
the  Count  regretted  he  could  say  very  little 
indeed.  Like  the  rest  of  his  countrymen 
who  had  a  jealous  regard  for  the  good  re- 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  111 


pute  of  Russia  abroad,  his  Excellency 
sincerely  deplored  the  frightful  popular 
emeute  in  the  Bessarabian  capital.  But 
there  were  one  or  two  things  to  be  borne  in 
mind  by  a  foreign  observer  and  commenta¬ 
tor,  he  was  anxious  to  point  out.  He  need 
not,  perhaps,  he  remarked,  dwell  upon  the 
unsophisticated  condition  of  the  Russian 
peasant  or  artisan;  his  simplicity,  igno¬ 
rance,  and  the  practically  unlimited  credence 
he  gave  to  sinister  and  plausibly  mis^ 
chievous  counsellors.  Against  these  quali¬ 
ties  in  the  simple  Russian,  there  was  to  be 
set,  "he  insisted,  the  vastly  superior  intel¬ 
ligence  of  the  Jew,  of  all  grades  and 
conditions.  .  It  was,  unfortunately,  an  in¬ 
disputable  fact,  in  his  opinion,  that  the 
J ews,  more  especially  where  they  were 
numerically  equal  to  their  orthodox  neigh¬ 
bours — ^and  in  South  Russian  centres  thev 
formed  the  predominant  elements^ — ex¬ 
ploited  the  Christians  in  a  hundred  un¬ 
scrupulous  ways,  to  their  own  aggrandise¬ 
ment.  The  Jew  not  only  knew  the  law 


112 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


better  than  his  Christian  neighbour,  but  he 
was  an  adept  in  circumventing  it.  Conse¬ 
quently  the  exploited  Eussian  failed  to  ob¬ 
tain  legal  redress,  and  occasionally  the 
ignorant  people,  instigated  by  the  worst 
class  of  criminals,  whose  only  object  was 
plunder,  took  the  law — ^according  to  their 
own  primitive  conception  of  it — ^into  their 
own  hands,  with  such  frightful  results  as 
were  lately  seen  in  Bessarabia. 

In  his  Excellency's  opinion  the  limita¬ 
tions  placed  upon  the  Jews  in  this  country 
should  be  made  somewhat  more  stringent, 
in  the  protective  interests  of  the  Jews  them¬ 
selves.  That  was  to  say,  he  remarked,  they 
should  be  deprived  of  much  of  the  immunity 
under  which  they  now  exploited  the  un¬ 
educated  Christians.  On  the  other  hand, 
improvement  might  be  effected  by  a  more 
careful  choice  being  made  in  the  appoint¬ 
ment  of  Governors  in  Jewish  centres. 
Younger  and  more  active  men  are  required, 
who  will  keep  themselves  fully  and  exactly 
au  courant  with  every  latent  movement 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  113 


among  the  people  under  their  jurisdiction. 
They  should  be  just,  intelligent,  and  alert 
Governors,  his  Excellency  said,  upon  whom 
it  would  be  practically  impossible  to  spring 
any  sudden  outbreak,  and  they  should  be 
prepared  to  apply  instantly  repressive 
measures  at  all  time. 

.  Count  Schouvaloff  would  not  enter  into 
any  discussion  of  the  Jewish  question  in 
Russia,  but  he  might  be  permitted  to  ob¬ 
serve  that  it  Avais,  in  his  opinion,  one  for 
Jews  themselves,  in  the  main,  to  solve. 
Generally  speaking,  he  had  little  hope  in 
any  change  for  the  better  in  the  inimical 
feeling  between  Jew  and  Christian  in 
Russia,  so  long  as  there  existed  no  standard 
of  commercial  rectitude  among  Jews. 
There  was  no  question  of  religious  intol¬ 
erance,  although,  unfortunately,  it  was  no 
difficult  thing  for  agents  provocateurs, 
whose  object,  as  already  said,  was  plunder, 
to'  arouse  the  fanaticism  of  simple  people  on 
occasions  like  Easter  festivals. 

Such  is  the  view,  briefly  expressed,  of  a 


114 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


Russian  Governor  whom  I  believe  to  be, 
from  the  evidence  of  my  own  Countrymen  in 
Odessa,  as  well  as  from  common  repute,  a 
singularly  honest  and  high-minded  mem¬ 
ber  of  the  gubernatorial  class  in  this 
country. 

Count  SchouvalofP,  on  parting,  cordially 
expressed  his  great  admiration  for  the 
most  progressive  and  enlightened  nation  in 
the  world,^^  and  fervently  trusted  the 
United  States  and  Russia,  as  the  two  great 
Pacific  powers,  would  ever  remain  the 
firmest  of  good  friends  and  neighbours. 

Interviews  with  three  prominent  Russian 
merchants — ^all  men  of  good  social  stand¬ 
ing^  and  repute — failed  almost  entirely  to 
elicit  any  more  friendly  expression  towards 
the  Jews.  They  denounced  as  inhuman  the 
iniquities  of  the  ignorant,  savage  mob  at 
Kishineft,  but  could  not  shut  their  eyes 
to  the  trade  trickeries  and  treacheries,’’  to 
use  their  own  words,  which,  at  the  hands  of 
grossly  ignorant,  lower-class  Russians, 
brought  such  terribly  retributive  punish- 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  116 


— a— —  — i— ■  I— — 1^— — — 

ment  upon  the  Jews.  None  of  these  gentle¬ 
men  could,  or  would,  admit  that  religious 
hatred  or  Paschal  rancour  were  the  incentive 
motives  of  the  terrible  outbreaks  against  the 
Hebrews.  There  were  exceptions,  of  course, 
they  were  careful  to  remark,  but,  generally 
speaking,  the  Russian  Jew  was  very  largely 
the  author  of  his  own  persecution. 

It  is  'alike  disappointing  and  depressing 
to  find  with  what  remarkable  unanimity 
this  unfavourable  view  is  taken  by  an  other¬ 
wise  fair-minded  class  of  Russians,  in  the 
South  Russian  capital.  Considering  that 
nearly  the  whole  of  the  trade  and  commerce 
of  the  city  and  port  of  Odessa  is  in  the  hands 
of  Jews,  it  is  only  natural  that  the  Chris¬ 
tian  merchants  opinion  of  his  Hebrew  rival 
and  neighbour  should  be  strongly  tinctured 
by  competitive  prejudice  and  jealousy. 
Much  allowance  must,  therefore,  be  made 
for  that;  but,  on  the  other  hand,  ’tis  no  less 
remarkable  that  among,  for  example,  the 
resident  foreign  Consular  corps  and  other 
independent  and  impartial  observers  in  the 


116 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


same  city,  it  is  almost  equally  difficult  to 
elicit  a  favourable  opinion  of  tbe  Jews, 
although  the  majority  of  these  authorities 
were  solicitous  to  qualify  their  opinions  by 
pointing  out  to  me  that  it  is  not  against  the 
Jews  themselves,  but  against  Jewish 
methods  and  their  shady  commercial  morale 
generally,  that  public  feeling  and  sentiment 
run  so  strongly. 

There  is  a  comparatively  large  English 
colony  in  Odessa,  and  the  shipping  is  almost 
entirely  in  the  hands  of  British  ship-brokers, 
and,  as  the  exporters  are  all  Jews,  these 
agents  have  intimate  knowledge  of  the 
latter.  Here,  again,  one  hears  the  same 
condemnatory  opinions  of  the  Jew’s  want  of 
commercial  morality.  This  is  not,  I  regret 
very  much  to  say,  a  pleasing  picture  of  the 
Jewish  element  in  this  great  Russian  centre, 
but  my  duty  and  resolve  is  to  give  a  faith¬ 
fully  accurate  record  of  the  opinion  and 
views  I  am  seeking  from  authentic  sources 
and  representative  people  of  all  classes. 
Among  educated  and  enlightened  Russians 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  117 


one  finds  anti-Semites  who  are  not  one  whit 
less  rancorous  than  the  ignorant  and  be¬ 
nighted  Mujik.  But  the  former  would  never 
dream  of  murdering  his  J ewish  neighbour. 

The  only  other  comment  that  suggests 
itself  in  connection  with  this  matter,  espe¬ 
cially  in  reference  to  Count  Schouvaloff^s 
implied  suggestion  that  the  Kishineft  mas¬ 
sacres  are  mainly  due  to  Jewish  exploita¬ 
tion  of  artisans  and  peasants,  and  to  their 
customary  commercial  trickery,  is  this : 
The  rioters  of  April  last  were  not  peasants, 
nor  were  the  victims  of  their  licensed 
brutality  usurers  or  profit-mongers.  The 
murderers  and  looterswere  chiefly  labourers 
and  artisans,  led  by  Seminarists;  and  the 
victims  were,  almost  in  all  instances, 
Hebrew  workingmen  and  their  families. 
The  sinister  influence  of  the  local  anti- 
Jewish  press  is  also  a  factor  in  the  origin 
of  the  riots  which  his  Excellency  overlooked, 
and  which  others  in  Odessa  did  not  refer  to 
when  expressing  their  views  upon  the 
Kishineff  reign  of  terror  at  Eastertide, 


118 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


Letter  III 

KishinefF;,  May  27, 10  P.  M. 

An  attempt  to  renew  disorder  near  the 
market  plaice  this  afternoon  was  promptly 
dealt  with  and  suppressed  by  the  military. 
A  large  crowd  gathered  about  five  o’clock, 
near  the  scene  of  the  first  outbreak  on 
Easter  Sunday,  when,  as  on  that  occasion, 
some  boys  were  made  use  of  to  test  the 
disposition  of  the  police  and  military  by 
throwing  stones  at  some  Jewish  residences. 
In  this  instance  there  was  no  hesitation  on 
the  part  of  the  authorities.  The  military 
rode  round  the  crowd  at  once,  and  hemmed 
them  in,  when  forty  of  the  leaders  and  in¬ 
stigators  were  immediately  arrested  and 
taken  to  the  prison. 

Hundreds  of  families  fled  from  the  city 
last  night,  owing  to  threats  that  the  deeds 
of  Easter  would  be  repeated  to-day.  The 
trains  to  Odessa  were  packed  with  fugitives, 
while  all  the  hotels  in  Kishinefi  were 
crowded  by  Jews  whose  wives  and  daughters 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  119 


could  not  leave  the  city,  and  dare  not  re¬ 
main  in  their  homes. 

The  more  I  make  myself  acquainted  with 
the  measures  which  seem  to  be  imperatively 
ordered  by  the  central  Government,  the 
more  I  am  convinced  that  the  authorities 
here  will  not  hesitate  for  a  moment  to  em¬ 
ploy  the  sternest  methods  to  preserve  order. 
Fifty  ball  cartridges  have  been  served  out 
to  each  soldier.  At  every  dangerous  point 
in  the  Jewish  quarters  soldiers  are  posted 
with  fixed  bayonets,  while  cavalry  patrols 
are  constantly  moving  from  one  quarter  to 
another,  day  and  night,  in  vigilant  surveil¬ 
lance  of  the  situation. 

I  visited  the  Jewish  districts  in  the  city 
and  suburbs  twice  to-day,  and  found  every¬ 
thing  quiet. 

The  city  is  still  paying  dearly,  in  the 
virtual  suspension  of  all  work,  for  the  riots 
in  April.  Business  is  completely  dis¬ 
organised  through  the  injuries  done  to 
shops  and  warehouses,  and  the  fiight  of 
Jewish  dealers  and  employers. 


120 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


I  desire  to  appeal  most  urgently  for  as¬ 
sistance  for  the  future  of  the  girls  and 
married  women  who  were  savagely  violated 
during  the  riots  at  Easter.  These  girls 
have  now  no  hope  of  marriage  where  the 
facts  of  their  dishonour  are  publicly  known. 
Under  the  rigorous  moral  law  of  Moses 
married  women  who  are  outraged  must  be 
divorced  from  their  husbands.  There  are 
several  such  cases  among  the  victims  of  the 
mob’s  brutality,  and  their  misfortunes, 
along  with  those  of  the  young  girls  referred 
to,  make  a  peculiarly  pathetic  appeal  to  the 
sympathy  of  those  who  may  be  blessed  with 
the  means  by  which  the  future  of  these  un- 
happy  creatures  might  be  made  less  miser¬ 
able  and  hopeless. 

There  are  also  from  fifty  to  one  hundred 
orphans,  children  of  murdered  fathers  and 
mothers,  who  are  to  be  provided  for.  Some 
of  the  money  subscribed  from  abroad  ought 
to  be  specially  ear-marked  for  alleviating 
these  three  classes  of  exceptional  suffering 
and  wrong. 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  121 


Letter  IV 

Berlin,  June  3d. 

Finding  it  impossible,  on  account  of 
the  Russian  censorship  of  all  telegraphic 
messages  relating  to  the  Kishineff  outrages, 
to  forward  this  despatch  from  that  city,  I 
do  so  from  this  point. 

I  have  completed  an  investigation  as  to 
the  origin,  authors,  'and  extent  of  the  recent 
massacres  and  looting,  while  I  have  also 
traversed  almost  the  whole  of  the  Jewish 
Pale  of  Settlement,  from  Odessa  to  Warsaw, 
inquiring  into  the  present  state  of  anti- 
Semitic  feeling  arising  out  of  the  outbreak 
at  Easter. 

The  origin  of  the  sanguinary  riots  at 
Kishineff,  on  the  19th  and  20th  of  April, 
was  not,  as  reported  in  the  Russian  official 
press,*  an  assault  by  a  Jew  proprietor  of  a 
merry-go-round  upon  a  Christian  woman, 
whereby  a  mob  of  peasants  were  incited  to 
attack  the  Jews.  There  is  no  truth  in  this 
account. 


*  See  M.  de  Plehve’s  version. 


122 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


The  real  origin  of  the  outbreak  was  this : 

The  only  daily  paper  in  Kishineff  is  the 
Bessarahetz.  It  is  a  violently  anti-Semitic 
organ.  Its  chief  editor  is  Pavolachi 
Kroushevan,  of  Moldavian  origin.  He  has 
systematically  inflamed  the  popular  feeling 
against  the  Jews,  as  the  foes  of  Kussia,  as 
the  propagandists  of  Socialism,  and  as  the 
enemies  of  the  Christian  religion.  These 
attacks  have  been  continuous  for  the  last  six 
years.  Merchants  and  employers  giving 
work  to  J ews  were  held  up  to  public  odium, 
and  the  expulsion  or  extermination  of  the 
race  was  openly  urged.  The  Bessarabetz 
has  a  circulation  of  20,000,  chiefly  among 
the  police,  municipal  employes,  and  work¬ 
men  generally. 

Two  events  occurring  shortly  before 
Easter  were  seized  upon  by  Kroushevan  to 
incite  the  mob  to  murderous  violence.  One 
was  the  murder  of  a  boy  belonging  to  the 
village  of  Doubossar,  situated  between 
Kishineff  and  Odessa,  by  his  relatives  for 
gain.  The  other  was  the  suicide  of  a  girl 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  123 


and  her  death  at  the  Jewish  Hospital  of 
Kishinetf.  The  Bessarahetz  declared  them 
to  be  both  ritual  murders  by  the  Jews,  and 
summoned  the  Russian  Ohristians  to  punish 
the  authors  of  the  alleged  crimes. 

The  chief  Rabbi  of  Kishineff,  fearing  from 
past  experiences  the  results  of  these  fero¬ 
cious  appeals,  hastened  to  the  Greek  bishop, 
and  implored  him  to  calm  the  popular  mind 
by  giving  an  episcopal  assurance  that  no 
such  ritual  was  practised,  and  no  such 
crimes  committed,  by  the  Jews.  The 
bishop^s  reply  was  that  he  feared  there  was 
some  Semitic  sect  which  really  did  indulge 
in  the  use  of  Christian  blood  in  the  Paschal 
ceremonies,  and  he  refused  to  intervene. 

Ten  days  before  the  riots  broke  out  a 
body  of  representative  Jews  visited  the  Gov¬ 
ernor  and  warned  him  that  Kroushevan's 
incitations  would  lead  to  murder,  unless 
restrained.  General  Von  Raaben  assured 
the  deputation  that  all  necessary  precau¬ 
tions  would  be  taken,  but  no  attempt  was 
made  by  him  to  stop  the  appeals  of  the 


124 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


Bessarahetz  to  the  popular  anti-Semitic 
hatred. 

Chief  of  Police  Tchemzenkov  was  also  re¬ 
quested  to  act  in  the  interest  of  peace,  and 
curb  the  diatribes  of  the  Bessarab etz.  He 
replied  that  it  would  serve  the  Jews  right 
if  they  were  driyen  from  the  city  for  en¬ 
couraging  the  propaganda  of  Socialism.’^ 

Having  by  the  blood  accusation  articles, 
and  through  the  circulation  of  a  Koumanian 
anti-Semitic  pamphlet  purporting  to  give 
instances  of  numerous  murders  of  Chris¬ 
tian  children  by  Jews,  roused  the  Kishineff 
populace  to  a  state  of  savage  fury,  Krou- 
shevan^s  local  accomplices  planned  an 
attack  for  the  Easter  holidays.  Kishineff 
Jews  declare  that  Kroushevan  came  to  the 
city,  in  disguise,  from  St.  Petersburg,  on  the 
eve  of  the  outbreak,  to  plan  the  riots.  This 
statement  I  could  not  get  verified.  *A  meet¬ 
ing  was  held  and  a  plan  of  attack  decided 
on.  A  few  days  previously  a  band  of 
strangers  arrived  at  Kishineff,  comprising 
thirty  Albanians  and  some  Macedonians, 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  125 


beliered  to  be  brigands  brought  especially 
for  an  attack  on  the  Jews. 

The  chief  instigators  of  the  riots  were 
Kroushevun  and  the  staff  of  the  Bessara- 
letz;  a  doctor  who  is  of  Greek  origin;  a 
Moldavian  doctor;  a  Moldavian  engineer; 
a  notary;  two  sons  of  a  prominent  mer¬ 
chant;  two  students,  sons  of  prominent  citi¬ 
zens;  two  Odessa  students;  two  minor 
officers,  and  several  well-known  citizens. 

The  actual  leaders  of  the  riots  were  stu¬ 
dents  and  Seminarists  from  the  Royal 
School  and  the  city  religious  colleges. 

All  the  statements  made  to  me  agree  that 
the  Seminarists  directed  the-  movements  of 
the  mob  on  both  days,  disguised  as  labourers 
and  strangers.  The  rioters  comprised  thirty 
bands,  averaging  fifty  each,  with  a  Semi¬ 
narist  on  a  bicycle  directing  the  attack. 
Some  of  the  bands  were  composed  of  the 
lower  employes  of  the  various  departments 
of  the  municipality—the  telegraph,  post 
office,  and  other  municipal  offices,  but  arti¬ 
sans  and  labourers,  and  Moldavians  from 


126 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


the  suburbs,  formed  the  greater  body  of 
the  rioters,  with  the  Albanian  strangers 
above  mentioned. 

These  bands,  with  sticks  and  stones,  but 
no  firearms,  attacked  the  Jewish  quarters  at 
thirty  different  points  simultaneously,  thus 
proving  a  deliberate  plan  of  operation. 

All  the  evidence  that  I  have  gathered 
during  eight  days  of  searching  inquiry  in 
Kishineff  convinces  me  that  the  riots  were 
not  a  casual  or  accidental  uprising  of  a  mob 
againist  the  Jews,  but  formed  a  carefully 
planned  attack  by  the  local  anti-Semitic 
leaders,  with  the  passive  connivance  of  the 
Chief  of  Police  and  the  active  encourage¬ 
ment  of  some  of  his  officers.  Von  Raaben^s 
deplorable  weakness  in  not  employing  his 
military  force  to  quell  the  riots  during  the 
first  day  is  responsible  for  the  horrors  of 
that  and  the  massacres  and  the  violations  of 
women  and  girls  of  the  second  day. 

The  majority  of  the  rioters  were  of 
Moldavian  origin.  These  Moldavians  are 
as  numerous  as  the  Jews  in  Kishineff  and 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  127 

constitute  the  most  ignorant  and  brutal 
element  of  the  populace. 

The  rioting  began  with  the  looting  of  the 
Jewish  shops  and  the  demolition  of  houses. 
The  mob,  finding  the  military  not  employed 
against  them  and  the  police  witnessing  the 
attacks  sympathetically—manyof  the  police 
taking  part  and  participating  in  the  looting 
—passed  from  murder  and  massacre  to  the 
violation  of  Jewish  women  and  girls. 

I  have  two  detailed  statements,  carefully 
prepared  by  eye-witnesses  of  the  scenes. 
One  is  a  copy  of  the  indictment  of  the 
authors  of  the  massacres,  which  has  been 
lodged  with  the  Procureur;  the  other  is  a 
specially  prepared  statement  by  two  Chris¬ 
tian  ladies,  one  Russian  and  one  Russo- 
French,  who  investigated  a  certain  class  of 
outrages  for  my  information.  Here  are  a 
few  instances  of  the  worst  crimes : 

The  Feldstein  family  is  one  of  the  most 
respectable  in  Kishineff.  The  mob  attacked 
their  saloon  on  the  corner  of  Armenia  Street 
at  noon  on  the  first  day,  Sunday,  April  9. 


128 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


The  police  barracks  are  some  forty  paces 
away.  The  soldiers  and  police  patrolled  the 
street  during  the  five  hours  occupied  by  the 
mob  in  demolishing  the  saloon  and  destroy¬ 
ing  fifteen  thousand  roubles’  worth  of  wines. 
A  safe  containing  a  large  sum  of  money  was 
also  broken  open  and  robbed.  While  that 
section  of  the  mob  Was  thus  employed,  the 
leader  of  the  gang  found  in  the  kitchen  of 
the  family  residence  the  meat  for  the 
family’s  dinner.  He  put  it  on  a  stick, 
mounted  to  the  roof  of  the  saloon,  which  is 
of  one  story,  and,  addressing  the  mob,  the 
police,  and  the  military  in  the  street,  de¬ 
clared,  “  Here  are  the  remains  of  a  Chris¬ 
tian  child  found  in  the  house  of  the  wealthy 
Jew,  Feldstein.” 

The  members  of  the  household  were 
saved  by  a  Russian  employd  of  Peld- 
stein  and  a  humane  gendarme,  from  the  fury 
of  the  mob.  On  completing  the  destruction 
of  the  place,  the  leader  drank  to  the  health 
of  Editor  Kroushevan  from  the  roof  of  the 
looted  premises. 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  129 


At  ]No.  13  Asia  Street  in  tlie  Bender 
Ro'gatka  quarter  some  of  the  worst  outrages 
were  perpetrated.  Twelve  families,  all 
Jewish  artisans,  lived  in  the  yard.  A  mob 
of  Moldavians,  some  Russian  workingmen, 
and  a  few  Albanians  attacked  the  occupants 
of  the  yard.  The  majority  of  the  Jewish 
men  escaped,  while  the  women  and  girls, 
numbering  sixteen,  concealed  themselves  in 
a  loft  under  the  roof  of  a  one-story  house. 
Four  Jewish  men  tried  to  defend  the  place, 
and  w^ere  murdered.  Their  wives  and 
daughters,  with  a  dozen  women  and  chil¬ 
dren,  had  taken  refuge  in  a  loft  under  the 
roof  of  No.  13.  It  was  from  some  of  these 
I  obtained  the  facts  here  recorded. 

One  Mottel  Greenspoon,  a  glazier,  was 
stunned  by  a  blow  from  a  bludgeon,  and 
the  Albanians  mutilated  him  w^hile  still 
alive.  They  then  choked  a  child,  two 

years  old,  and  cut  out  its  tongue,  while 
alive. 

The  other  three  men  were  killed  and  then 
had  feathers  put  on  their  faces.  As  an  act 


130 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


of  desecration  of  the  dead,  two  drunken 
women,  one  Moldavian  and  one  Bulgarian, 
trampled  on  the  body  of  Greenspoon  as  it 
lay  mutilated  in  the  yard.  The  mob  then 
found  its  way  to  the  loft  where  the  women 
were  concealed,  and  remained  several 
hours.  All  the  women  and  girls  were 
violated. 

All  this  time  the  police  and  soldiers  were 
patrolling  the  open  space  in  front  of  the 
house  where  these  fiendish  crimes  were  com¬ 
mitted.  I  saw  blood  spattered  on  the  walls 
of  the  rooms  and  yard,  and  picked  up  a 
child’s  schoolbook  on  which  some  murderer 
had  wiped  his  hands. 

At  the  household  Foudyn,No.  33  Gostinna 
Street,  four  men  and  one  woman  were  killed. 
Sixteen  families  lived  in  this  yard,  all  those 
of  artisans.  The  mob  came  the  first  day 
and  demolished  the  windows  and  doors.  It 
returned  the  next  day  for  massacre.  Six¬ 
teen  women  and  eight  children  were  con¬ 
cealed  in  the  loft.  The  first  killed  was  a 
boy  of  sixteen,  who  begged  piteously  for  life, 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  131 


saying  he  had  done  no  wrong,  was  a  scholar 
of  the  state  school,  and  wanted  to  live.  His 
father,  at  the  other  end  of  the  yard,  heard 
the  boy's  cries,  but  could  not  save  his  life. 
They  killed  him  while  the  father  lay  stunned, 
unable  to  make  an  effort  to  save  the  boy's 
life.  It  was  Mr.  Baranovitch,  the  father  of 
the  boy,  a  most  intelligent  and  respectable 
man,  who  told  me  the  story  of  his  son's 
murder.  As  at  the  house  in  Asia  Street,  the 
women  and  girls  who  had  concealed  them¬ 
selves  in  the  loft  were  discovered  and  vio¬ 
lated  by  the  mob.  One  married  woman 
escaped  through  the  roof,  leaped  to  the 
ground,  ran  to  the  nearest  police  station,  and 
implored  help,  but  she  was  driven  out  by  the 
officer,  who  said  the  Jews  were  only  receiv¬ 
ing  what  they  deserved.  Another  married 
woman  named  Feya  Katzap  was  bludgeoned 
to  death  in  the  yard  of  this  house. 

The  scene  of  the  most  diabolical  crimes 
and  violations  committed  by  the  mob  was 
the  Skulanska  Rogatka  suburb,  eighty  per 
cent,  of  the  population  of  which  are  Molda- 


132 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


vians,  the  Jews  forming  the  remainder. 
This  is  the  residence  of  the  poorer  class  of 
the  workers  of  both  races.  The  mob  broke 
into  the  yard  on  the  evening  of  the  second 
day,  Monday,  April  20.  Twenty-five  per¬ 
sons,  mostly  women  and  children,  hid  them¬ 
selves  in  a  carpenter^s  shed  owned  by  one 
Grillspoon.  The  houses  in  the  yard  were 
demolished,  and  the  mob  was  going  away 
when  the  cry  of  a  child  in  the  shed  indicated 
the  place  of  concealment  of  the  women.  The 
shed  was  instantly  attacked  by  Moldavians, 
led  by  a  father  and  son,  who  were  neigh¬ 
bours  of  the  Jews.  Grillspoon,  the  owner 
of  the  shed,  was  killed,  together  with  four 
other  artisans,  w^ho  were  defending  the 
place,  and  one  woman,  the  wife  of  the 
owner,  was  murdered  after  violation.  The 
mob  also  found  a  pretty  girl,  named  Feya 
Wouller,  aged  thirteen,  and  her  fate  is  so 
awful  that  I  can  only  state  that  after  having 
been  violated  by  more  than  a  dozen  of  these 
Moldavians  they  fought  for  her  body  like 
famished  wolves  after  life  was  extinct. 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  133 


When  found  the  next  morning  by  her  rela- 

tives  the  body  was  seen  to  be  literally  torn 
in  two. 

The  sister  of  Feya  Wouller,  whose  brother 
died  trying  to  defend  the  women  and  chil¬ 
dren,  assured  me  that  the  Moldavian  leader 
and  his  son,  who  led  the  mob  in  his  district, 
are  walking  about  free  at  this  moment. 
Three  brothers,  well-known  in  the  city,  are 
implicated  in  several  of  the  murders.  A 
car-driver  and  his  two  sons  took  part  in 
four  murders  and  general  looting,  but  none 
of  these  men  are  now  in  prison.  The  Jews 
killed  by  the  car-driver  and  his  son  are 
Eydel  Drochman,  one  Galantor,  one  Kantor, 
and  the  boy  Baranovitch. 

During  the  worst  stages  of  the  riot  the 
chief  police  officer,  Tchemzenkov,  drove 
through  the  city  smoking  cigarettes.  At  one 
period  of  the  disturbance,  on  the  morning 
of  the  second  day,  the  Jews  of  the  New  Ba¬ 
zaar  organised  a  body  of  about  150  to  defend 
themselves,  but  Police  Officer  Dobroselsky, 
on  finding  them  able  to  drive  the  mob  away. 


134 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


arrested  several  of  the  defenders  and  broke 
up  the  body. 

Among  the  prominent  looters  of  the  J ews’ 
shops  was  the  soldier  servant  of  a  military 
surgeon;  and  a  son  of  a  murdered  woman, 
Keyla  Konza,  declares  that  among  those 
who  violated  and  killed  his  mother  were 
four  common  soldiers. 

Joseph  Newman  testifies  that  his  father 
was  killed  in  the  presence  of  Policeman 
Stepanovitch. 

A  Christian  Eussian  says  that  he  heard 
the  students  from  Odessa  shout  to  the  mob, 

Kill  the  Jews ! 

A  prominent  employd  in  the  municipal 
office  in  the  city  was  declared  to  be  an  active 
director  of  the  mob,  showing  where  the  Jews 
lived,  and  shouting,  Kill  the  Jews!  ’’ 

Several  police  officers  did  their  duty  and 
saved  many  lives  in  the  Jewish  districts. 
Among  these  was  Officer  Sloutschevsky,  of 
Bender  Rogatka,  who,  with  twelve  men, 
drove  the  mob  away.  They  went  from  this 
to  the  Asia  Street  district,  where  another 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  135 

police  officer  was  patrolling,  and  he  allowed 
them  to  commit  the  murders  described. 
Some  artillery  officers,  who  were  off  duty, 
manfully  saved  several  Jewish  women. 

On  the  morning  of  the  first  day’s  out¬ 
break  large  crosses  were  chalked  on  the 
houses  of  the  Christians  living  in  streets  in¬ 
habited  by  the  Jews,  and  none  of  these  dwell¬ 
ings  or  shops  were  injured.  Ikons  (images) 
were  shown  in  the  windows  of  other  houses', 
and  thus  indicated  places  not  to  be  attacked. 
During  the  progress  of  the  first  day’s  out¬ 
rages  the  Bishop  of  Kishineff,  while  on  his 
way  to  dinner  with  a  rich  noble,  passed  in 
his  carriage  through  the  mob,  giving  his 
blessing  to  the  crowd.  Upon  hearing  of 
this  incident,  I  refused  to  believe  it  possible, 
and  resolved  to  interview  the  nobleman, 
who  is  Michael  Nicolavitch  Kroupensky. 
He  received  me  courteously,  and  said : 

Bishops  in  Russia  always  give  blessings 
to  people  when  passing  through  the  streets. 
This  was  purely  an  accidental  coincidence. 
The  Bishop  is  a  humane  man,” 


136 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


So  that  the  fact  remains  that  the  Bishop 
did  pass  through  the  mob  on  his  way  to  din¬ 
ner,  and  uttered  no  word  to  persuade  the 
mob  to  stop  its  murder  and  pillage. 

The  Jews  are  convinced  from  every  evi¬ 
dence  that  the  outbreak  was  a  plan  of  the 
local  anti-Semitic  leaders  to  punish  and  ter¬ 
rorise  the  Jews  for  their  supposed  propa¬ 
ganda  of  Socialism  in  conjunction  with  the 
leaders  of  the  Socialists  of  Western  Europe. 
The  fanaticism  and  superstition  of  the  Mol¬ 
davian  and  Russian  mob  were  then  excited 
by  the  fabricated  stories  of  Jewish  ritual¬ 
istic  murders  of  Christian  children,  to  cover 
the  organised  political  plot  against  the  local 
Socialist  movement.  I  was  informed  by 
Nobleman  Kroupensky  that  on  the  day  fol¬ 
lowing  the  riots  thirty  young  J ews  were  ar¬ 
rested,  and  that  five  of  them  were  found  to 
be  in  possession  of  pamphlets  appealing  to 
the  workingmen  of  Russia  to  demand  a  con¬ 
stitutional  government  like  that  of  England. 
Some  officials  of  the  municipal  department, 
some  police  officers,  and  others  connived  at 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  137 


the  attack  in  order  to  crush  the  alleged  Jew¬ 
ish  Socialist  propaganda.  The  artisans  and 
labourers  had  been  appealed  to  by  the  Bes¬ 
sarab  etz  to  drive  out  the  Jew  workers,  who 
labour  for  low  wages,  and  thus  do  muck  in¬ 
jury  to  Christian  families.  No  evidence  was 
adduced  for  me  to  implicate  the  Government 
at  St.  Petersburg  in  a  responsibility  for  the 
outbreak  which  had  covered  Rusma’s  name 
with  shame,  but  Minister  de  Plehve  must 
have  known  that  some  kind  of  manifestar 
tion  was  contemplated.  Thinking,  probably, 
the  affair  would  not  culminate  in  massacres, 
but  might  assume  the  character  of  an  anti- 
Socialist  demonstration,  he  took  no  steps  to 
meet  the  emergency  which  aetually  arose 
until  too  late.  The  present  Vice-Governor 
of  Bessarabia,  Councillor  of  State  Ostro- 
goff,  is  a  notorious  anti-Semite.  This 
fact,  coupled  with  threats  of  the  police  and 
the  murderers  at  large  that  the  next  attack 
will  be  a  St.  Bartholomew  for  the  Jews  of 
Kishineff,  explains  the  flight  of  nearly  all 
the  Jewish  leaders  and  wealthy  members  of 


138 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


the  race  from  the  city,  leaving  only  the  poor 
members  of  the  Hebrew  community  appre¬ 
hending  a  renewed  attack. 

The  military  measures  to  preserve  order 
were  adequate  when  I  left  Kishineff  on  Fri¬ 
day  morning,  but  if  these  are  relaxed  in  any 
way,  no  protection  remains  for  the  ter¬ 
rorised  men,  women,  and  children  against 
further  violence.  The  journal  edited  by 
Kroushevan  is  still  circulating  in  the  city, 
and,  while  more  restrained  in  its  language 
than  before  the  massacres,  it  is  keeping _alive 
the  racial  animosity  against  the  defenceless 
Jews.  I  would  urge  the  following  measures 
to  afford  some  immediate  protection  for  the 
Jews  of  Bessarabia  and  the  Pale: 

First,  that  the  Government  at  St.  Peters¬ 
burg  issue  a  ukase  declaring  there  is  no 
truth  in  the  horrible  fiction  of  Jewish  ritual 
murders  of  Christian  children ;  second,  that 
the  bishops  and  clergymen  of  all  cities, 
towns,  and  villages  be  compelled  to  read  the 
same  from  their  pulpits,  thereby  stopping 
the  circulation  of  these  atrocious  legends 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  139 


within  the  borders  of  Russia  ;  third,  that  a 
conference  of  the  leading  Jews  of  Western 
Europe  be  held  without  delay,  to  consider 
the  best  means  to  solve  the  problem  of  the 
Russian  Jew,  and  how  best  to  help  the  Jews 
of  the  Pale  to  protect  themselves  under  the 
existing  Russian  laws. 

Unless  some  action  of  this  nature  is  taken 
soon,  more  outrages  will  follow.  I  found 
the  feeling  in  the  larger  cities,  where  the 
Jews  are  strong,  very  excited  and  apprehen¬ 
sive.  In  one  city  the  Jews  have  purchased 
9000  revolvers  to  protect  themselves.  There 
is  a  constant  panic  in  Kiev,  from  which 
most  of  the  wealthy  Jews  have  fled  to  Cra¬ 
cow,  while  Jewish  refugees  from  Kishineff 
were  refused  shelter  on  their  arrival  at  Kiev 
by  the  terrifled  J ews  of  that  city. 

In  Warsaw  I  found  more  confidence  than 
elsewhere,  as,  in  this  large  city,  with  its 
quarter  of  a  million  of  Jews,  the  Polish  So¬ 
cialists,  who  are  a  strong  organisation,  have 
promised  to  aid  the  Jews  if  any  attack 
should  be  made  on  them  by  the  anti-Semites. 


140 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


The  Governor,  General  Tchetverikoff,  is  a 
capable  officer,  free  from  anti-Semite  preju¬ 
dices,  and  he  has  made  it  plain,  in  the  meas¬ 
ures  already  taken,  and  in  some  straight 
talk,  that  he  will  deal  promptly  and 
sternly  with  any  attempt  to  repeat  the 
Kishineff  ruffianism  in  the  city  under  his 
control. 

Throughout  the  whole  Pale  the  police  and 
peasants  are  told  by  the  anti-Semites  that 
the  Tsar  has  issued  an  order  to  kill  all  the 
Jews  or  drive  them  from  Russia, 

Letter  Y. 

London,  June  6th. 

The  situation  at  Kishineff  at  the  present 
time  is  this:  The  military  measures  in 
force  are  fully  adequate  for  an  instant  re¬ 
pression  of  any  attempted  renewal  of  out¬ 
rages.  Owing,  however,  to  the  notorious 
anti-Semitic  leanings  and  record  of  the 
Vice-Governor,  Ostrogoff,  the  Jews  who 
have  fled  the  city,  and  the  poorer  class  who 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  141 


suffered  most  and  who  cannot  leave  for  lack 
of  means,  dread  another  outbreak. 

They  likewise  note  the  indulgent  punish¬ 
ments  inflicted  upon  the  directors  of  the 
riots,  while  several  men  known  to  have  com¬ 
mitted  murder  and  to  have  been  implicated 
in  the  tortures  of  women  were  actually  lib¬ 
erated  from  prison  after  a  few  days’  deten¬ 
tion,  on  the  ground  of  alleged  lack  of  suffi¬ 
cient  evidence  of  their  guilt.  The  feeling 
in  Kishineff  is  general  that  the  rank  and 
file  of  the  rioting  bands  were  retained  in 
custody,  while  the  instigators  and  ring¬ 
leaders  were  permitted  to  go  free. 

I  do  not  credit  the  statement  going  the 
round  of  the  press  which  alleges  that  Gov¬ 
ernor  Von  Raaben  telegraphed  to  St.  Pe¬ 
tersburg  for  permission  to  use  the  military 
in  Kishineff  in  dealing  with  the  mob,  and 
that  he  waited  vainly  for  an  authoritative 
reply.  No  such  permission  was  needed 
from  either  Minister  de  Plehve  or  the 
head  of  any  other  department.  The  crim¬ 
inal  code  armed  the  local  Governor  with 


142 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


the  fullest  power  and  discretion  for  the 
employment  of  soldiers  within  his  govern¬ 
ment  or  province  as  a  supplementary  force 
to  the  police  to  preserve  order.  There  were 
8000  military  and  350  police  at  Yon  Kaa- 
ben’s  command  during  the  first  day^s  riot, 
and  he  was  as  much  in  absolute  control 
of  those  forces  in  the  task  of  dealing  with 
the  outbreak  against  the  Jews  as  the  Gov¬ 
ernor  of  New  York  State  would  be  of  the 
State  militia  in  a  similar  emergency. 

As  to  the  question  of  remedy:  What  can 
be  done  to  safeguard  the  men,  women,  and 
children  within  the  Jewish  Pale,  from 
Odessa  to  the  Baltic,  from  periodic  out¬ 
rage;  and  free  the  name  of  a  great  empire 
from  the  reproach  of  such  organised  Chris¬ 
tian  barbarism  as  that  of  Kishineff?  This 
question  cannot  be  dismissed  on  the  plea 
that  American  and  European  opinion  is 
concerned  only  with  the  humane  task  of 
relief.  The  best  possible  measure  of  relief 
that  could  be  offered  to  the  victims  of  anti- 
Semitic  oppression  in  Kussia,  at  this  crisis, 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  143 


would  assume  tlie  character  and  form  of  a 
friendly  mediating  influence  exercised  with 
the  Tsar  in  behalf  of  the  Jews  of  his 
Empire. 

I  have  discussed  this  idea  with  a  high 
Russian  official  during  my  tour,  and  I 
briefly  summarise  our  conyersation. 

In  reply  to  my  question  as  to  what  could 
be  done  by  the  friends  of  Russia  in  the 
United  States  to  procure  some  better  pro¬ 
tection  for  the  Russian  Jew,  this  official, 
who  is  thoroughly  conversant  with  both 
American  and  British  politics,  said : 

It  is  no  use  appealing  to  Russia  through 
the  medium  of  indignation  meetings.  This 
is  not  how  to  exercise  a  friendly  influence 
such  as  is  desired.  We  resent  attempts  to 
meddle  in  our  domestic  affairs  through  the 
agency  of  political  demonstration.  It  is 
an  unwarranted  interference  by  other  coun¬ 
tries  in  our  internal  concerns.  How,  may  I 
ask,  would  your  Government  and  press  con¬ 
sider  our  action  if  we  organised  great  gath¬ 
erings  and  delivered  violent  speeches  in  pro- 


144 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


test  against,  say,  the  burning  alive  of 
American  citizens,  not  alone  without  trial, 
but  independent  even  of  the  form  of  legal 
indictment?  You  must  look  at  the  position 
of  our  Government  in  relation  to  the  hateful 
crimes  of  Kishineff  from  many  points  of 
view.  Our  system  of  administration  differs 
radically  from  yours,  while  the  civil  posi¬ 
tion  of  the  Jews  here  has  no  parallel  in 
civil  and  political  conditions  in  America 
except,  perhaps,  in  your  treatment  of  the 
Negro  and  the  Ohinaman.  Whatever 
faults  our  system  may  possess  in  your  eyes, 
we  consider  it  as  being  adapted  to  the  do¬ 
mestic  requirements  of  Russia,  and  to  the 
social  temperament  of  our  people.  We  are 
not  in  any  sense  a  cruel  or  a  persecuting 
nation,  nor  do  we  hate  the  Jews  on  any 
religious  ground.  But  we  never  will  ad¬ 
mit  a  people  so  foreign  in  every  respect  to 
the  Russians  in  racial  traits  and  character, 
in  faith  and  in  general  reputation,  to  an 
equality  of  citizenship.  You  might  as  well 
ask  the  American  people  to  permit  China- 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  145 


men  to  become  Mayors  of  San  Francisco  or 
members  of  Congress.  There  is  something 
more  to  be  said  in  relation  to  Kishineff; 
not  in  any  sense  by  way  of  palliating  the 
horrible  outrages  which  I  condemn  as 
strongly  as  you  do,  but  in  the  way  of,  say, 
such  an  explanation  as  a  Governor  of  Ala¬ 
bama  or  Carolina  would  try  to  account 
to  civilised  opinion  for  some  act  of  a  mob 
of  Christian  citizens  in  burning  a  fellow- 
citizen  at  the  stake.  The  Jew  in  Russia  is 
the  disciple  and  propagandist  of  So¬ 
cialism.  He  has  introduced  this  menace  to 
our  Government  and  system  from  abroad. 
He  is  believed  by  the  tens  of  thousands  of 
our  people  who  are  employed  in  our  de¬ 
partments  to  be  their  racial  enemy,  and 
the  foreign  plotter  inside  our  gates  against 
the  Tsar,  who  is  the  head  of  the  svstem 

e/ 

which  gives  them  their  means  of  livelihood 
and  some  prospect  of  future  positions  for 
their  sons. 

These  are  the  class  of  Russians  who  hate 
the  Jews  most,  and  the  hatred  is  begotten 


146 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


of  the  same  human  selfishness  which  stirs 
up  strife  between  rival  classes  in  other 
countries. 

“  It  is  necessary  to  know  all  this  in  order 
to  understand  the  fact  that  many  persons 
above  the  rankof  artisans  and  labourerstook 
part  in  the  shameful  outrages  at  Kishineff. 

Allow  me  now  to  reply  direct  to  your 
question : 

I  can  only  make  a  suggestion,  which  is 
this :  Let  some  prominent  statesman  or 
highly  respected  citizen  of  the  United 
States  visit  St.  Petersburg  and  seek  an  in¬ 
terview  with  the  Emperor.  This  would  be 
welcomed  as  an  act  of  friendship,  and  could 
not  be  considered  as  an  intrusion  even  by 
our  Governpient  officials.  The  Tsar  would 
be  sure  to  receive  such  a  visitor  as  the 
spokesman  of  friendly  American  feeling. 

No  kinder-hearted  man  lives  to-day 
than  the  Emperor.  No  one  in  your  country 
deplores  the  outrages  of  April  more  than  he 
does.  Moreover,  like  all  Kussians,  he  holds 
the  great  American  nation  in  high  esteem, 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  147 


and  cherishes  the  friendly  relations  which 
have  so  long  subsisted  between  the  two 
countries.  If,  then,  some  one  of  your  lead¬ 
ing  men,  commanding  wide  respect,  would 
undertake  such  a  mission,  he  would  accom¬ 
plish  a  thousand  times  more  to  guarantee 
the  Jews  against  further  outrage  than 
10,000  public  meetings  organised  by  the 
Jews  of  your  cities  or  on  the  suggestion 
of  Russia’s  kind  friends  on  the  London 
press.” 

I  most  urgently  beg  your  advocacy,  and 
that  of  the  American  press  generally,  of  this 
proposal.  It  would  be  a  mission  worthy  of 
a  statesman,  and  its  certain  fruits  would  be 
the  Tsar’s  protection  for  the  Jews  from 
Odessa  to  Warsaw  against  further  organ¬ 
ised  outrage  during  his  lifetime. 

The  public  man  in  the  States  eminently 
qualified  for  this  humane  mission  is  ex- 
President  Cleveland.  Such  an  ambassador 
on  a  friendly  visit  to  St.  Petersburg  would 
attract  the  world’s  attention,  and  success 
would  be  sure  to  crown  his  undertaking. 


148 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


I  attended  several  meetings  of  tiie  Central 
Belief  Committee  while  in  Kishineff.  The 
last  one  was  on  the  eve  of  my  departure, 
last  Friday.  The  committee  meets  daily  to 
examine  applications  and  distribute  assist¬ 
ance  in  money,  food,  and  clothing.  Kishi- 
neff  is  divided,  for  relief  purposes,  into 
twenty-two  districts.  Each  has  its  local 
committee,  who  report  to  the  Central  Exec¬ 
utive  Committee  of  Fifteen,  whose  chair¬ 
man,  Dr.  J.  S.  Mutznik,  is  a  leading  physi¬ 
cian  and  one  of  Kishineff^s  wealthy  resi¬ 
dents.  Assisting  him  are  several  equally 
representative  Jews,  like  Dr.  Kohan-Bem- 
stein,  Kabbi  Ettlinger,  S.  M.  Grossman,  E. 
Galperin,  S.  Perelmutter,  I.  Kipperwasser, 
E.  Reidel,  M.  Kligman,  Z.  Rosenfeld,  Israel 
Pappervasses,  and  several  other  well-known 
citizens. 

A  Ladies^  Committee  gives  valuable  co¬ 
operation,  attending  to  and  reporting  upon 
the  women,  girls,  and  orphans  requiring  aid. 
These  ladies  showed  me  over  the  food,  eloth- 
ing,  and  general  assistance  departments  of 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  149 

the  Central  Committee  Headquarters.  I 
found  everything  well  organised  and  effi¬ 
ciently  executed.  The  Kabbis  and  leading 
members  of  the  Ladie'S^  Committee  have 
founded  an  asylum  for  the  orphans  of  mas¬ 
sacred  parents. 

I  visited  this  temporary  asylum  and  pho¬ 
tographed  the  orphans  and  their  guardians. 
Up  to  the  date  of  my  departure  the  Central 
Eelief  Committee  had  expended  a  total  of 
130,000  roubles;  one-fourth  of  which  was 
used  in  the  purchase  and  distribution  of 
food  for  the  people  whose  homes  had  been 
destroyed,  and  for  others  made  workless  by 
the  riots.  Small  sums  of  money  had  been 
advanced  to  the  owners  of  shops  and  little 
stores  to  enable  them  to  renew  business; 
1000  roubles  were  given  in  several  in¬ 
stances. 

This  action  of  the  Committee  was  severely 
criticised  by  the  friends  and  representatives 
of  the  Jews  who  were  killed.  These  com¬ 
plained  that  the  money  contributed  from 
abroad  ought  to  be  apportioned  according 


150 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


to  relative  loss,  and  that  the  subscribers 
would  not  estimate  the  injury  done  to  a 
tailor^s  or  shoemaker^s  store  at  three  or 
four  times  the  value  of  a  murdered  father, 
mother,  or  brother. 

In  this  connection,  I  pointed  out  to  Dr. 
Mutznik  that,  as  those  whose  stores  were 
looted  could,  under  Kussian  law,  claim  ade¬ 
quate  compensation  from  the  city  or  the 
government,  it  would  be  more  equitable  to 
devote  the  major  portion  of  the  funds  re¬ 
ceived  to  the  present  and  future  assistance 
of  those  who  have  suffered  the  greater 
wrong  and  injury  in  the  loss  of  parents,  of 
employment,  and  in  other  ways.  To  this 
view  he  agreed,  though  he  was  very  doubtful 
if  the  claims  for  compensation  already 
lodged  in  behalf  of  the  store-owners  will 
be  fairly  dealt  with,  or  even  considered,  by 
the  authorities. 

Under  the  law  as  it  stands,  three  inde¬ 
pendent  witnesses  must  depose,  not  alone  to 
the  injury  done  to  a  particular  store  or 
business,  but  to  the  person  or  persons  ac- 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  151 


cused  of  being  guilty  of  the  looting  or  de¬ 
struction.  And  no  blood  or  marriage  rela¬ 
tive  of  the  person  seeking  redress  is  per¬ 
mitted  to  testify !  Under  such  conditions, 
and  in  view  of  the  fact  that  most  of  the  male 
Jews  fled  and  hid  themselves  when  the  out¬ 
break  occurred,  many  of  the  claims  for  com¬ 
pensation  will  fall  to  the  ground  for  want  of 
sufficient  evidence  as  to  the  names  and  com¬ 
plicity  of  the  actual  perpetrators  of  the 
destruction. 

Dr.  Mutznik  believes  that  the  relief  work 
must  be  continued  during  the  coming 
winter,  to  the  larger  number  of  artisans 
and  labour  applicants.  Most  of  the  Jew¬ 
ish  merchants  and  employers  have  fled  to 
Odessa,  Cracow,  and  other  cities.  They  will 
not  return  until  they  are  assured  of  safety, 
and  in  their  absence  those  whom  they  em¬ 
ployed  will,  in  all  probability)  remain  with¬ 
out  work. 

My  appeal  through  the  press  in  behalf 
of  the  violated  women  and  girls,  and  for  the 
orphans,  was  warmly  endorsed  by  the 


152 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


Ladies’  Oommittee  and  tiie  Eabbis.  Mes- 
dames  Mutznik  and  Hornstein,  leading 
members  of  this  committee,  with  true 
matronly  feeling,  pleaded  the  exceptionally 
hard  cases  of  the  young  girls  and  of,  the 
violated  married  women.  The  case  of  the 
orphans  speaks  for  itself,  and  needs  no 
advocacy  apart  from  the  cruel  facts  which 
plead  so  forcibly  for  their  utter  helpless¬ 
ness. 

When  visiting  these  little  ones  in  their 
temporary  shelter,  and  while  learning  from 
the  girls  and  women,  whom  the  Kabbi  as¬ 
sembled  in  his  house  to  meet  me,  the  stories 
of  the  irreparable  wrongs  done  them,  and 
their  fears  of  the  future  now  before  them,  I 
could  not  help  indulging  in  the  hope  that 
some  wealthy  Jewish  merchant  or  banker  in 
New  York,  London,  or  Paris  might  have  the 
heart  and  head  to  bring  himself  a  life’s 
happiness  in  the  humane  task  of  aiding 
these  orphans  and  terribly  wronged  girls 
and  women  which  all  the  wealth  of  all 
the  Jews  in  any  one  of  these  cities  could 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  153 


not  purchase  in  palaces,  banks,  or  pleas¬ 
ures. 

A  Warsaw  paper  having  published  an 
account  of  the  appeal  in  behalf  of  the 
Kishineff  sufferers,  my  hotel  soon  became  a 
centre  of  attention  and  of  supplication. 
Hundreds  of  poor  creatures  of  both  sexes 
came  to  beg  to  be  enabled  to  emigrate. 
They  had  heard  that  the  American  was  pro¬ 
posing  to  devote  some  of  the  money  sub¬ 
scribed  in  New  York  and  elsewhere  to  the 
task  of  taking  a  few  thousand  families 
away  from  the  city  of  blood  to  the  United 
States  or  to  the  Argentine.  No  matter  what 
was  the  proposed  destination,  they  were 
willing  to  go,  if  it  were  only  to  some  country 
where  Christians  did  not  kill  Jews.  One 
petition,  signed  in  behalf  of  122  families, 
was  presented  to  me  to  be  forwarded  to  the 
American  in  the  hope  of  having  an  early 
consideration  of  their  claims. 

No  explanation  by  my  most  capable 
dragoman  would  disabuse  the  minds  of 
these  poor  people  of  the  forlorn  belief  that 


154 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


escape  from  a  dreaded  recurrence  of  the 
horrors  of  April  might  lie  in  such  a 
petition. 

Among  my  most  persistent  callers  were 
two  matronly-looking  ladies,  who  also 
begged  to  be  sent  to  America.  On  the  first 
occasion  they  did  not  disclose  the  nature  of 
their  calling,  or  the  extent  of  their  losses. 
I  pressed  them  on  these  points  when  they 
came  again.  One  of  them  replied,  Our 
business  has  fallen  off  entirely  since  the 
riots.” 

And  what  was  the  business,  inquired  my 
dragoman. 

We  are  mid  wives,”  was  the  answer. 
The  petition  had,  of  course,  to  be  refused. 

Letter  yi 

London,  June  6th. 

A  few  facts  concerning  Kishineff  will 
be  essential  to  the  right  comprehension 
of  the  causes  which  led  to  the  perpetra¬ 
tion  of  the  black  deeds  of  April,  and  to  a 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  155 

proper  understanding  of  a  story  of  deliber¬ 
ately  plotted  political  crime. 

The  last  census,  that  of  1897,  gave  to 
Kishineff  a  population  of  108,296  souls. 
Of  these  over  50,000  were  males.  The 
present  estimated  population  may  be  put 
down  at  or  about  130,000.  These  are 
divided  racially  as  follows  :  Jews,  50,000; 
Moldavians  (Christians),  50,000;  Russians, 
8000,  with  the  residue  comprising  Bul¬ 
garians,  Serbs,  Greeks,  Macedonians,  Al¬ 
banians,  and  Germans.  These  figures  and 
estimates  are  given  me  by  Dr.  Kohan-Bern- 
stein,  a  leading  physician  of  the  city,  and 
are  confirmed  by  one  of  the  Rabbis,  who 
holds  some  kind  of  a  government  position  in 
connection  with  the  special  taxes  levied  on 
the  Jews. 

The  Jews  are  thus  numerically  in  excess 
of  the  Russians  and  of  all  other  Christian 
sects  combined,  excepting  the  Moldavians, 
who  are  equally  strong  in  numbers,  and 
even  more  bitter  in  their  anti-Semitic  feel¬ 
ing  than  those  of  Russian  blood. 


156 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


Fully  fifty  per  cent,  of  the  Jews  of  Kish- 
ineff  are  artisans  and  labourers,  and  in  the 
great  majority  of  cases  they  are  wretchedly 
poor.  The  stern  needs  of  daily  life,  the 
want  of  bread  and  the  shelter  of  a  home, 
compel  them  to  work  for  any  pay  that  may 
be  offered  to  them. 

The  Jewish  artisan  is  far  and  away  more 
intelligent  and  skilled  than  his  Moldavian 
or  Eussian  neighbour  of  like  occupation. 
He  is  more  expert  in  technical  details,  and 
more  ambitious  to  do  better  and  to  perform 
more  work  for  his  employer.  Poor  as  he 
may  be  he  reads  more  newspapers,  and  is  an 
all-round  formidable  rival  to  workers  who 
dislike  him  for  his  race,  and  who  dread  him 
as  an  increasing  and  competing  factor  in  the 
industrial  world  of  Kishineff. 

These  facts  will  account  to  some  extent 
for  the  part  which  Christian  workers  took 
in  the  organised  riots  of  April. 

One  fact  more  in  this  connection  has  an 
important  bearing  upon  another  feature  of 
the  outbreak — the  pillaging  of  shops  and 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  157 


saloons.  Kishineff  is  the  capital  of  Bessa¬ 
rabia,,  and  is  its  largest  trading  and  com¬ 
mercial  centre.  There  are  rival  Christian 
and  Jewish  interests  at  work  in  catering  for 
the  needs  of  so  large  a  place,  and  these 
interests  collide  in  competitive  activity  in 
almost  every  branch  of  business  life. 

There  are  shops,  warehouses,  and  saloons 
where  Christian  and  Jewish  rivalry  con¬ 
flicts,  and  in  such  a  combat  the  Gentile  is 
nowhere,  in  trade  competition,  with  the 
fertile  and  adroit  Jew.  Hence,  there  is  as 
strong  a  commercial  antipathy  toward 
the  unpopular  Hebrew  in  fairly  educated 
Russian  and  Moldavian  circles  as  is  found 
on  other  grounds  among  the  anti-Semitic 
artisans  and  labourers. 

These  circumstances  account  for  the  com¬ 
placency — to  put  it  no  stronger — with 
which  merchants  and  leaders  of  the  Chris¬ 
tian  community  looked  on  at  the  pillaging 
of  shops  and  the  destruction  of  saloons 
which  belonged  to  their  Jewish  rivals.  And 
they  also  explain  why  saloons  and  stores  of 


158 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


Jewish  ownership  were  alone  the  objects 
of  the  mob^s  attention ;  for  the  riot  was  not 
an  affair  of  blind,  popular  fury,  bent  upon 
indiscriminate  lawlessness.  Nothing  of  the 
kind.  It  was  deliberately  organised  and 
intelligently  directed  from  start  to  finish  by 
leaders  who  knew  what  they  were  about, 
and  how  to  discriminate  between  Kussian 
and  Moldavian  property  and  Semitic  be¬ 
longings,  in  the  matter  of  looting,  and  be¬ 
tween  Jewish  and  Christian  women  in 
another  and  more  infernal  business. 

Kishineff,  in  its  central  and  chief  busi¬ 
ness  parts,  is  a  handsome  town.  Its  leading 
boulevard,  Alexandra  Street,  would  do 
credit  to  any  American  city.  It  is  more 
than  twice  the  width  of  Broadway,  New 
York;  is  planted  on  both  sides  with  acacia 
trees,  and  can  boast  of  imposing  public 
buildings,  substantial  shops,  banks,  and 
jewellers’  stores. 

The  municipal  headquarters,  built,  like 
most  of  the  prominent  structures  of  the  city, 
with  a  whitish  stone,  is  situated  near  the 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  159 


middle  of  the  leading  thoroughfare  and 
wears  a  stately  and  striking  appearance. 
The  streets  are  all  wide  and  run  as  in 
American  cities,  at  right  angles  to  each 
other  in  uniform  arrangement.  They  are 
nearly  all  planted;  a  feature  which  adds 
greatly  to  the  beauty  of  the  city,  in  combin¬ 
ing  the  light  green  foliage  of  the  acacia  trees 
with  the  bright,  clean  look  of  the  houses  and 
public  buildings. 

The  Royal  Gardens  and  People’s  Park  are 
in  the  centre  of  the  city.  Military  bands 
play  each  evening  in  the  former,  and  attract 
large  crowds  of  well-dressed  citizens, 
officers  of  the  garrison,  youth,  and  particu¬ 
larly  ladies. 

The  city,  in  its  chief  business  and  fashion¬ 
able  districts,  has  the  look  of  a  comfortable, 
fairly  wealthy,  up-to-date  bourgeois  centre, 
and  a  well-governed  municipal  community; 
a  most  unlikely  place,  in  the  eyes  of  a 
visitor,  to  offer  itself  as  a  theatre  for  one  of 
the  most  abominable  tragedies  in  modern 
times. 


160 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


Kishineff  owes  its  success  and  prosperity 
almost  exclusively  to  tlie  Jews.  Thirty 
years  ago  it  was  little  more  than  a  rough 
Bessarabian  village.  To-day  it  ranks,  in 
South  Eussia,  next  to  Odessa — where  there 
are  over  200,000  of  the  same  race — in  popu¬ 
lation,  commercial  standing,  and  wealth, 
and  all  this  is  freely  admitted  by  educated 
Kussians. 

Jews  in  Kussia  are  compelled  by  law  to 
reside  inside  a  Pale  of  Settlement,  or  ter¬ 
ritory  comprising  some  fifteen  governments, 
or  provinces,  of  western  and  southern  Eus- 
sia,  extending  south  from  the  coast  of  the 
southern  Baltic  to  the  Crimea,  and  west¬ 
ward  from  Charkov  and  Smolensk  to  the 
borders  of  Eoumania,  Galicia,  and  Prus¬ 
sian  Poland.  The  area  thus  embraced 
in  the  Jewish  Pale  is  about  equal  to 
that  of  France,  and  the  number  of  peo¬ 
ple  of  this  section  of  Eussia  is  upward  of 
27,000,000. 

Under  the  ukase  of  1882,  which  compelled 
Jews  to  leave  the  villages  and  live  within 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  161 


the  towns,  these  centres  became  crowded  in¬ 
side  of  what  thus  became  virtual  economic 
concentration  camps. 

Within  these  limits^of  legal  domicile  the 
density  of  Hebrew  population  is  at  the  rate 
of  some  2800  per  square  mile.  In  the  non- 
Jewish  towns  of  Russia  the  average  is  about 
60  of  urban  to  1000  of  rural  population. 
Within  the  fifteen  provinces  included  in  the 
Jewish  Pale,  the  average  is  close  upon  230 
of  urban  to  every  1000  of  country  popula¬ 
tion. 

The  effects  of  this  crowding  of  Jews  into 
the  towns  of  the  Pale  are  as  obvious  as  they 
are  inevitable.  There  is  a  dense  popula¬ 
tion,  restricted  by  necessity  and  disposition 
to  certain  pursuits  and  occupations,  in 
places  where  the  economic  conditions  do  not 
provide  opportunities  for  the  healthy  exer¬ 
cise  of  one-fourth  of  the  industry  or  abilities 
which  could  under  normal  conditions  find 
opportunities  for  profitable  employment. 

There  are  towns  in  which  Jewish  trades¬ 
men  and  artisans  are  50  per  cent,  of  the 


162 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


total  population.  They  are  literally  penned 
in  within  these  places. 

This  is  the  economic  side  of  the  problem 
of  the  Eussian  Jew.  The  political  side  is 
even  more  serious  to  the  Eussian  adminis¬ 
tration,  and  here  we  are  approaching  the 
consideration  of  what  was  the  real  under¬ 
lying  cause  of  the  outbreak  O'f  a  month 
ago. 

All  the  Jews  of  the  Pale  are  not  poor. 
Quite  the  contrary.  Despite  the  restricted 
area  allowed  them,  large  numbers  of  them 
are  wealthy  through  successful  trading. 
Another  and  larger  section  exploit  inferior 
Eussian  intelligence  and  capacity,  and  earn 
money  in  legally  forbidden  ways  by  making 
it  fairly  profitable  for  the  obliging  Chris¬ 
tian  to  act  as  a  shield  or  deputy  for  the 
legally  boycotted  Jew. 

Saloons  are  owned  in  this  way  by  Jews, 
and  are  worked  for  them  by  Christians. 

The  J ew  must  not  own  land.  But  he  can 
organise  a  company,  place  a  Eussian  in 
nominal  headsihip  of  the  concern,  and  in  this 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  163 


manner  make  a  profit  out  of  Russian  ag¬ 
riculture. 

In  many  other  ways  the  keen  intelligence, 
the  inherited  racial  capacity  for  financial 
undertakings,  the  greater  natural  ability 
and  better  education  of  the  business  Jew, 
and  also  of  the  higher  artisan  Hebrew  sec¬ 
tion,  enable  them,  even  in  the  face  of  all  the 
obstacles  put  in  their  way,  to  give  their  sons 
and  daughters  an  education  which  is  grad¬ 
ually  evolving  out  of  an  oppressed  and  de¬ 
graded  race  a  people  of  progressive  thought 
and  of  political  aspirations,  who  are  deemed 
to  be  a  most  dangerous  menace  to  the 
government  and  administration  of  an  auto¬ 
cratically  ruled  country. 

The  educated  Jew  in  Russia  is  more  than 
an  accidental  ally  of  what  may  be  termed 
Russian  liberal  tendencies.  He  occupies 
within  this  huge  empire  a  semi-penalised 
political  and  racial  status. 

None  of  the  higher  state  schools  must  ad¬ 
mit  more  than  5  per  cent,  of  Jew  pupils, 
even  where,  as  in  Kishineff,  the  Jews  are 


164 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


five  times  more  numerous  tlian  the  Russians 
proper. 

The  Jew  cannot  buy  land. 

He  is  debarred  from  administrative  posi¬ 
tions,  except  in  lower  grades  of  employment, 
and  while  he  is  compelled  to  serve  in  the 
army,  he  cannot  claim  the  usual  rewards  or 
aspire  to  the  ordinary  ambition  of  men  who 
make  no  greater  sacrifice  than  he  in  the 
common  military  service  of  the  empire. 

All  these  facts,  disabilities,  and  oppres¬ 
sive  and  depressing  conditions,  acting  upon 
the  thoughts  and  ideals  of  a  brainy  people, 
are  producing  a  powerful  anti-Russian  po¬ 
litical  force  along  the  southwestern  portion 
of  the  Tsar^s  most  vulnerable  frontier — that 
bordering  upon  the  Austrian  and  Germanic 
empires.  In  other  words,  the  Jewish  Pale 
is  becoming  the  nursery  of  revolutionary 
Socialist  ideas  and  the  active  centre  of  an 
anti-autocratic  propaganda. 

The  riots  and  terrorism  of  April,  with 
their  attendant  horrors,  were  deliberately 
planned,  not  by  robbers  or  murderers,  not 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  165 


on  account  of  religious  bigotry,  but  for  the 
reasons  I  have  just  given — namely,  the  feel¬ 
ing  of  hostility  in  the  minds  of  admin¬ 
istrative  employes  to  a  race  believed  to  be 
plotting  against  the  Empire,  combined  with 
the  jealousy  of  local  artisans  and  prole¬ 
tarians  of  the  cheaper,  better,  and  pushing 
Hebrew  workingmen,  compelled  by  absolute 
necessity  to  earn  a  living  within  a  legally 
circumscribed  sphere  of  industrial  activity. 

Hence,  on  the  direct  incitation  of  the  local 
anti-Semite  Bessarabetz  newspaper,  edited 
by  a  Russian,  who  is  really  a  Moldavian, 
and  which  is  the  only  paper  published  here 
and  read  by  administrative  employes.  Sem¬ 
inarists,  and  other  enemies  of  Jews,  it  was 
resolved,  in  an  organised  riot,  to  strike 
terror  into  the  Jewish  community  of  Kishi- 
neff,  with  the  double  object  of  punishing 
what  is  believed  to  be  a  hostile  element  con¬ 
spiring  against  the  Government,  and  of 
forcing  the  Jews  to  leave  the  city. 


166 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


Letter  VII 

Dalkey,  June  9th,  1903. 

The  hideous  realities  of  the  actual  out¬ 
rages  committed  during  the  two  days' 
inferno  of  murder  and  outrage  surpass  in 
the  naked  horror  of  their  details  almost 
anything  which  the  imagination  could  in¬ 
vent.  I  hate  to  return  to  further  reference 
to  these  deeds.  It  has  become  a  horrible 
and  repugnant  subject,  but  I  convince  my- 
self  that  some  good  will  come  of  it  in  tend¬ 
ing  to  keep  alive  the  sympathy  of  the 
American  people  in  the  future  of  the  vic¬ 
tims  who  escaped  with  life,  but  also  with 
broken  hearts  and  the  outlook  of  a  dismal 
future. 

Meyer  Weissman  had  a  very  small  store 
in  one  of  the  poorest  Jewish  quarters  of  the 
city.  He  had  lost  an  eye,  by  an  accident, 
when  young.  The  mob  attacked  and  de¬ 
molished  his  little  grocery  on  Easter  Sun¬ 
day.  He  offered  them  all  the  money  in  his 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  167 


possession  to  spare  his  life.  It  was  a  sum 
of  sixty  roubles.  The  leader  took  the 
money,  and  then  said :  Now,  we  want  your 
eye ;  you  will  never  again  look  upon  a  Chris¬ 
tian  child.’’  He  implored  them  to  kill  him 
instead  of  making  him  blind  for  life.  They 
gouged  out  his  eye  with  a  sharpened  stick, 
and  left  him.  Amidst  sobs  and  suffering  he 
told  me  his  story  in  the  Jewish  Hospital. 

Near  the  bed  of  poor  blind  Meyer  Weiss- 
man  was  that  of  Joseph  Shainovitch,  whose 
head  had  been  battered  with  bludgeons,  and 
the  victim  left  for  dead.  He  told  me  that 
it  was  this  same  gang  who  killed  his  mother- 
in-law,  by  driving  nails  through  her  eyes 
into  the  brain.  This  story  I  refused  to  be¬ 
lieve,  thinking  it  might  be  born  of  some 
horrible  nightmare  following  the  poor  fel¬ 
low’s  terrible  experience.  But  from  no  less 
than  six  different  sources,  one  of  them  being 
a  Christian  doctor,  I  learned  that  the  facts 
were  as  stated  by  Joseph.  Among  the 
other  witnesses  were  the  men  who  dug  the 
unfortunate  woman’s  grave. 


168 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


In  the  female  ward  of  the  same  hospital 
there  were  still  upwards  of  a  dozen  girls 
and  married  women,  when  I  visited  the 
place,  whose  injuries  were  too  serious  to 
allow  of  their  discharge.  I  heard  their 
stories :  at  least  those  which  could  in  part 
be  related  to  a  man. 

One  of  the  girls,  aged  about  seventeen, 
was  a  perfect  type  of  Jewish  beauty,  with  a 
face  which  a  painter  would  envy  as  a  model 
for  a  Rachel.  Her  head  was  covered  with 
bandages.  She  had  been  alone  for  three 
hours  in  the  hands  of  a  dozen  men,  who  had 
killed  her  father  and  mother,  and  they  left 
her  for  dead.  A  young  Jew,  evidently  her 
lover,  sat  at  her  bedside  while  the  tale  of  her 
sufferings  and  losses  was  being  told. 

In  the  next  bed  was  a  married  woman,  a 
mother  of  four  children.  She  had  not  fully 
recovered  consciousness,  and  all  the  events 
of  the  night  of  her  agony  were  as  yet  not 
completely  known  to  her.  She,  too,  had 
been  beaten  and  left  for  dead,  after  having 
been  assaulted  by  many  men. 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  169 


At  the  Rabbits  house,  as  already  related,  I 
met  several  more  victims  of  the  mob^s  name¬ 
less  infamies.  One  was  a  girl  of  sixteen, 
named  Simme  Zeytchik,  very  pretty,  and 
childish-looking  for  her  years.  She  said 
that  all  her  assailants  were  Russians, 
mainly  Seminarists,  and  told  the  Rabbi  that 
fifteen  of  these  young  ruffians  had  outraged 
her. 

She  was  one  of  twenty  women  who  had 
sought  refuge  in  the  loft  of  the  house  No.  11 
Nicolaievskai  Street,  and  who  were  dis¬ 
covered  by  the  mob,  as  were  several  other 
groups  of  women  and  girls  in  similar  hid¬ 
ing-places. 

I  have  before  me  a  record  of  thirteen  girls 
and  women  of  ages  ranging  from  seventeen 
to  forty-eight,  who  were  assaulted  by  from 
two  to  twenty  men,  and  in  many  cases  left 
for  dead. 

Six  young  girls  who  are  known  to  have 
undergone  similar  violence  were  ashamed 
to  come  to  the  Rabbi's  house  to  tell  their 
tale  of  wrong  and  ruin. 


170 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


The  foregoing  list  does  no't  exhaust  the 
number  of  women  who  were  subjected  to  the 
greatest  wrong  that  can  be  done  to  their  sex. 

All  house-breaking  and  robbery  were  sus¬ 
pended  in  the  night-time  during  the  out¬ 
break,  and  the  younger  men  of  the  thirty  or 
forty  gangs  of  rioters  went  in  search  of  the 
hidden  girls  and  married  women.  Those 
who  can  do  so  naturally  hide  the  narrative 
of  their  wrong,  and  suffer  in  silence.  The 
actual  number  of  the  mob^s  victims  in  the 
most  ruffianly  of  their  crimes  will  therefore 
never  be  fully  known. 

Apart  from  the  desperate  and  hopeless 
efforts  of  the  forty  murdered  men  to  save 
wives  and  daughters,  and  the  solitary  at¬ 
tempt  at  organised  resistance  described  in 
a  previous  letter,  the  10,000  or  12,000  Jew¬ 
ish  men  of  Kishineff  offered  little  or  no 
resistance  to  the  1500  or  2000  Moldavian 
and  Kussian  assailants  of  their  women, 
homes,  and  property.  Ninety  per  cent,  of 
them  hid  themselves,  or  fled  to  safer  parts  in 
and  out  of  the  city  for  refuge. 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  171 


A  thousand  determined  men,  even  in  spite 
of  the  action  of  the  Chief  of  Police  in 
■sdrtually  protecting  the  mob,  could  have 
saved  many  lives  and  averted  most  of  the 
outrages  on  the  women  and  girls.  One 
plucky  little  Jew,  Leon  Koulberg  by  name, 
a  member  of  the  Kishineff  Fire  Brigade, 
with  only  a  few  helpers,  faced  a  band  of 
fifty-six  Moldavians  and  drove  them  from 
his  district. 

Many  Russians  of  both  sexes  nobly 
exerted  themselves  to  protect  the  women 
from  the  mob.  But  from  no  quarter  in  the 
city,  and  from  no  source,  did  I  learn  of  any 
attempt  being  made  by  Russian  or  Mol¬ 
davian  clergymen  (with  one  solitary  excep¬ 
tion  )  to  perform  a  similar  Christian  duty. 

Instances  of  incredible  baseness  on  the 
part  of  the  Moldavians  were  given  me  by 
various  witnesses. 

Mordka  Mynduik  was  escaping  from  a 
gang  of  ruffians  in  the  Skulanska  Rogatka 
suburb.  He  was  invited  into  a  Moldavian 
neighbour's  house,  and  murdered  by  those 


172 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


who  had  offered  him  hospitality  and  pro¬ 
tection. 

Israel  Ullman  fell  a  victim  to  a  similar 
act  of  Moldavian  perfidy. 

Three  men  and  a  woman  with  a  child 
were  fieeing  from  pursuers,  and  were 
directed  to  take  a  certain  course  over  a  field 
towards  the  railway  station.  They  ran  into 
an  ambush,  and  two  of  the  men  were  killed, 
the  woman  and  child,  however,  escaping. 

Another  woman  and  her  child  sought  the 
house  of  a  converted  Jew  for  safety,  after 
her  home  had  been  demolished.  The 
Christian  J ew  holds  a  position  under  the 
City  Government.  He  knew  the  frightened 
woman  well,  and  had  been  on  terms  of  the 
closest  intimacy  with  her  family  before 
climbing  into  office  as  the  reward  of  his 
conversion.’^  He  shut  the  door  in  the  face 
of  the  terrified  wife  of  his  former  friend. 

What  impressed  one  most  painfully  in 
Kishineff,  after  the  narratives  of  outrage^ 
was  the  seeming  indifference  of  the  mass  of 
the  Eussian  and  Moldavian  people  over  the 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  173 


whole  infernal  business.  They  had  to 
recognise  the  great  injury  done  to  the  city 
by  the  riots  and  their  results.  That  was 
too  patent  to  be  ignored.  But,  with  the  ex¬ 
ception  of  a  comparatively  small  number  of 
Christians,  already  alluded  to,  there  ap¬ 
peared  to  be  neither  regret  nor  remorse 
among  the  citizens  generally  over  the  deeds 
which  had  riveted  the  world^s  attention 
upon  them  as  a  community  capable  of 
perpetrating  acts  so  base  and  inhuman. 
This  callous  bearing  I  attribute  mainly  to 
the  tactics  of  the  anti-Semitic  press,  com¬ 
bined  with  the  amazing  silence  maintained 
by  the  Greek  Church  prelates  and  clergy  in 
relation  to  these  crimes. 

The  Bessarabetz  and  Znamya^  the  only 
papers  circulating  in  Kishineff,  audaciously 
blamed  the  Jews  for  what  had  occurred,  and 
carefully  abstained  from  reproducing  the 
comments  of  foreign  journals  upon  the  riot¬ 
ing  at  Eastertide.  By  this  means  the  peo¬ 
ple  were  prevented  realising  the  extent  and 
character  of  the  external  indignation 


174 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


aroused  by  the  reports  of  the  events  of 
April,  and  they  were  left  by  these  means,  or 
by  their  own  indifference,  a  community  ap¬ 
parently  unconcerned  about  the  massacres 
and  infamies  which  had  found  victims  only 
among  Jews. 

As  far  as  I  could  learn,  there  had  not  been 
a  solitary  word  spoken  or  act  done  by  any  of 
the  prominent  ecclesiastical  authorities  of 
Kishineff  which  could  be  construed,  even 
charitably,  into  a  condemnation  of  the  kill¬ 
ing  of  harmless  men  and  the  ravishing  of 
innocent  girls  beneath  the  shadows  of  the 
many  Christian  churches  which  adorn  the 
capital  of  Bessarabia.  The  sufferers  were 
only  Jews. 

Each  evening  during  my  stay  in  this  soul¬ 
less  city  large  crowds  gathered  in  the  Eoyal 
Gardens  to  enjoy  the  music  of  the  fine  Dra¬ 
goon  Band  which  performed  Polish  polkas, 
and  the  Hungarian  Ohardash  and  Kus- 
sian  marches  in  faultless  fashion.  Throngs 
of  gaily  dressed  ladies,  under  the  escort  of 
the  young  officers  of  the  garrison,  were 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  175 


always  in  evidence,  along  with  students 
from  the  colleges  and  Seminarists  supplied 
by  the  religious  high  schools  of  the  city. 
It  was  fashionable  Kishineff^s  rendezvous 
for  evening  enjoyment,  recreation,  and  social 
gossip,  and  the  tables  of  the  cafds  rang 
with  laughter  when  the  groups  of  visitors 
were  not  drinking  in  the  music  of  some 
operatic  selection  or  of  an  inviting  waltz 
from  the  band. 

Not  a  single  Jew  had  been  seen  in  this 
place  of  popular  resort  since  April  19th. 

One  evening  my  dragoman  called  my  at¬ 
tention  to  a  group  of  young  Seminarists  sit¬ 
ting  at  a  table  near  to  ours.  They  were 
boisterous  in  their  merriment,  and  appeared 
to  be  enjoying  the  recital  of  some  unusually 
piquant  incident  or  adventure,  amidst  the 
smoke  of  their  cigarettes  and  the  relish  of 
their  coffee. 

That  gang,’’  observed  my  dragoman, 
‘‘judging  from  what  I  have  heard  some  of 
them  say,  must  have  been  among  those  who 
violated  the  girls  and  women  in  the  loft  of 


176 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


No.  11  Nicolaievskai  Street,  where  Simme 
Zeytchik  was  outraged  by  a  number  of 
young  students.’’ 

It  was  only  that  morning  we  had  seen  this 
girl  of  sixteen  at  the  Rabbi’s  house,  and 
heard  her  story. 

The  Mayor  of  Kishineff,  M.  Karl  Schmidt, 
received  me  most  courteously  when  I  called 
upon  him  in  the  fine  municipal  buildings  on 
the  Alexandra  boulevard.  He  has  been 
burgomaster  of  the  city  for  a  quarter  of  a 
century,  almost  in  unbroken  succession.  A 
man  of  some  sixty  summers,  of  tall  and 
commanding  appearance  and  of  cultured 
manner,  he  impresses  you  at  once  with  the 
feeling  that  you  are  in  the  presence  of  a* 
strong,  capable,  and  upright  personality. 

He  willingly  accorded  me  an  interview, 
but  answered  my  questions  in  a  manner  sug¬ 
gesting  a  reserve  which  was  more  official 
than  personal : 

‘^What  was  the  origin  of  the  outbreak, 
Mr.  Mayor?  ” 

The  writings  in  the  anti-Semitic  press, 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  177 


and  their  effect  upon  the  minds  of  ignorant 
people  who  dislike  the  Jews  both  for  their 
race  and  religion.  The  alleged  murder  by^ 
J ews  of  the  Christian  boy  at  Doubossar  and 
of  a  girl  here  in  Kishineff,  who  committed 
suicide,  inflamed  the  populace.  When  the 
real  facts  were  published,  the  truth  was 
believed  to  be  an  invention  to  cover  up  a 
Jewish  crime,  and  the  frequenters  of  caf^s 
and  the  workingmen,  who  are  hostile  to  the 
Jews,  remained  convinced  that  Christian 
blood  had  been  actually  obtained  in  this 
way  for  ritual  purposes.’’ 

Do  you  find  the  Jews  of  the  city  a  tur¬ 
bulent  or  provocative  people?  ” 

No.  They  resemble  most  other  people, 
in  having  good  and  bad  numbered  among 
them.  There  has  been  nothing  whatever 
in  their  behaviour,  as  far  as  my  many  years’ 
experience  of  Kishineff  goes,  to  explain  or 
in  any  way  to  palliate  the  attacks  made 
upon  them.  The  great  mass  of  them  are 
very  poor,  but  they  are  most  patient  and 
never  disorderly.” 


178 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


Have  they  any  secret  or  revolutionary 
society  here? 

Nothing,  in  my  belief,  worth  serious 
attention.  Some  of  the  younger  Jews 
call  themselves  Socialists,  but  there  are 
not  many,  and  I  do  not  think  they 
need  cause  the  authorities  any  serious 
anxiety.’^ 

Is  there  any  similar  organisation,  under 
any  name,  among  the  Kussian  or  Moldavian 
workingmen  ?  ’’ 

There  is  some  kind  of  a  society  which 
scatters  pamphlets  about  and  things  of 
that  kind  from  time  to  time.  Its  mem¬ 
bers  were  among  the  rioters  and  against 
the  Jews.’^ 

Do  you  take  the  reports  of  the  riots  in 
the  matters  of  the  killed,  wounded,  and  loot¬ 
ing  as  having  been  exaggerated?  ’’ 

No.  I  am  sorry  to  say  there  were  more 
people  killed  than  the  forty-three  reported 
deaths.  A  few  bodies  have  been  found  since 
the  last  report  was  issued.  The  number  of 
persons  wounded  is  difficult  to  find  out. 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  179 


Many  poor  Jews  who  want  to  obtain  a  share 
of  the  relief  funds  declare  they  were  in¬ 
jured,  but  they  carry  no  traces  of  wounds 
or  hurts,  when  examined.  The  accounts  of 
the  destruction  of  dwellings  and  stores  have 
not  been  overstated..  Enormous  damage  has 
been  done,  and  both  the  city  and  the  actual 
sufferers  will  feel  the  great  loss  for  years  to 
come.  I  understand  you  have  been  visiting 
the  scenes  of  the  disorders,  and  you  can 
judge  for  yourself  as  to  the  extent  of  the 
damage  and  mischief  done.’’ 

Do  you  anticipate  any  recurrence  of  the 
trouble  on  the  Emperor’s  day?  ”  (Date  of 
the  Tsar’s  Coronation,  May  27th.) 

I  have  seen  the  Vice-Governor  on  the 
matter,  owing  to  the  rumours  you  mention, 
and  I  am  satisfied  he  will  act  promptly  and 
severely  if  any  attempt  of  the  kind  should 
be  made.  He  will  post  soldiers  at  all  points 
of  danger  near  where  the  Jews  reside,  and 
these  will  be  under  officers  who  will  have 
orders  to  fire  on  any  persons  who  may  try 
to  renew  the  riots.” 


180 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


“  Is  it  true,  as  reported,  that  the  police 
were,  to  some  extent,  participators  in  the 
Easter  outrages?  ’’ 

That  is  not  an  easy  nor  yet  a  pleasant 
question  to  answer.  I  have  no  control  of 
any  kind  over  the  police  force  of  the  city, 
and  I  was  not  a  witness  of  the  disgraceful 
events  in  April.  Some  loot  was,  I  believe, 
found  in  the  possession  of  a  few  policemen, 
and  this  fact  has  given  rise  to  the  charge  to 
which  you  refer.  But  it  is  most  unfair  to 
impute  to  all  the  force  of  the  city  and  to  its 
officers  conduct  so  disgraceful,  owing  to  the 
very  few  who  were  mixed  up  with  the  dis¬ 
turbers  and  their  looting.’’ 

What  forces,  military  and  police,  were 
in  the  city  in  April?  ” 

Probably  about  seven  or  eight  thousand 
troops  and  three  hundred  police  and 
officers.” 

Surely,  there  were  in  these  forces  means  - 
enough  to  have  dealt  promptly  and  effec¬ 
tively  with  the  bands  of  rioters?  ” 

The  Mayor  showed  evidence  of  painful 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  181 


hesitation  before  replying  to  this  question, 
but  ultimately  said : 

Oh,  there  was  a  most  lamentable  and 
unfortunate  misunderstanding !  Where¬ 
upon  he  politely  handed  me  another  cigar¬ 
ette,  to  indicate  that  it  would  be  no  use  to 
pursue  that  subject  any  further. 

Can  you  suggest  any  remedy  to  prevent 
these  anti-Semitic  outbursts,  Mr.  Mayor?  ’’ 
I  fear  not.  The  Oovernment  measures 
promulgated,  from  time  to  time,  with  re¬ 
gard  to  the  Jews,  are  deemed  necessary  for 
the  preservation  of  order.  I  cannot  discuss 
the  worth  or  wisdom  of  these  measures,  but 
I  can  understand  why  the  J ews  should  think 
them  unjust.” 

.  One  question  more,  sir :  Do  you  think 
that  the  Zionist  movement  offers  any  feasi¬ 
ble  or  effective  solution  of  the  question?  ” 
As  the  Mayor  of  Kishineff,  I  would  con¬ 
sider  the  loss  of  the  Jewish  community  as 
a  commercial  calamity  for  the  city.  But,  I 
confess,  if  I  were  a  Jew,  I  would  be  a 
Zionist^^ 


CHAPTEE  IX 


HI.  M.  DE  PLEHVE^S  VERSION 
HE  official  explanation  from  the  Rus- 


-JL  sian  Grovernment  was  made  by  M.  de 
Plehve,  Russian  Minister  of  the  Interior, 
to  Mr.  Arnold  White.  The  following  is  the 
full  text  of  the  document,  which  was  sent  to 
Mr.  White  in  the  English  language,  and 
published  in  The  Times j  J une  13, 1903 : 

Russia’s  agricultural  and  labour  popula¬ 
tion  is  ill  at  ease,  living  common  life  with 
Jewish  inhabitants  of  wide-developed  com¬ 
mercial  instinct.  Hence  constant  antago¬ 
nism,  material  racial  religious  character 
coming  to  verge  of  frenzy  at  least  possible 
occasion.  Strained  relations  between  Rus¬ 
sians  and  Jews  of  Bessarabia  were  made  the 
worst  by  fact  of  finding  outlying  village 
murdered  Christian  boy,  murder  attributed 
by  population  to  ritual  Jewish  habits. 


182 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  183 


Official  denials  ritual  murder  not  given 
credit  by  peasants,  attributing  other  mur¬ 
ders  of  Christians  in  towns  Kiev  and 
Kishineffi  likewise  to  Jews.  On  Easter 
Day,  on  market  place  of  Kishineff,  workers 
holiday-making  saw  a  Jew  proprietor  of 
carousing  machine  strike  a  Christian 
women,  who  fell  to  the  ground,  letting  go 
her  infant  baby.  This  incident  was  nearest 
cause  of  outburst.  Workers  began  break¬ 
ing  windows,  pulling  down  Jewish  stores 
as  sign  of  protest.  Police,  which  always 
gives  much  to  be  desired  in  provincial 
towns,  failed  to  make  efficacious  inter¬ 
vention,  the  many  thousand  mass  of 
onlookers  and  holiday-makers  approving 
riot,  hindering  policemen’s  actions.  After 
demonstrators  came  plunderers’  outbreak, 
lasting  from  five  in  the  afternoon  to  ten  eve¬ 
ning,  and  leaving  nine  Jewish  bodies  on 
place.  Night  brought  disturbance  to  end 
what  goes  far  to  prove  momentous  character 
of  outbreak  letting  loose  popular  passions 
with  strength  natural  forces.  On  Monday 


184 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


morning  Jews  wishing  intimidate  and  inflict 
punishment  on  Christian  workers,  began  on 
market  place,  assembling  in  groups  armed 
sticks  and  weapons;  Jews  being  more 
numerous  had  best  of  it  in  two  flrst  en¬ 
counters,  and  a  Christian  was  seen  to  fall, 
receiving  bullet  wound.  This  called  forth 
popular  passion  in  all  its  abject  force  and 
abomination.  Russian  peasants  driven  to 
frenzy,  excited  by  race  religious  hatred, 
under  influence  of  alco-hol,  being  worse  than 
South  Americans  lynching  negroes.  Un¬ 
fortunately  Governor  of  Bessarabia  did  not 
make  appearance  in  person.  Easter  Sun¬ 
day  and  Monday  gave  over  command  to 
military  men  what  he  had  no  right  of  doing, 
as  he,  in  consequence,  had  put  the  police 
aside,  and  on  the  other  hand,  left  the 
military  forces  without  actml  guidance. 
'Troops  can  take  towns  by  assault,  but  can¬ 
not  carry  out  police  duties  without  special 
instructions.  In  the  end,  the  town  being 
divided  in  districts,  with  a  special  military 
command  in  each,  the  disturbances  ceased 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  185 


on  Monday  evening.  By  this  time  the  Min¬ 
ister  of  the  Interior  had  ordered  by  wire  to 
proclaim  martial  law,  »and — an  unprec¬ 
edented  fact — had  sent  the  Director  of 
Police  Department  to  investigate  as  to  the 
responsibilities  of  local  officials.  In  con¬ 
sequence  the  Governor,  the  chief  of  the  town 
police,  and  some  other  officials  were  dis¬ 
missed  outright.  Many  hundreds  of  rioters 
are  in  prison  with  hard  work  in  the  Siberian 
mines  awaiting  them  after  trial.  The  Min¬ 
ister  of  the  Interior  has  issued  a  circular  to 
the  Governors  all  over  Russia  authorising 
them  to  make  immediate  use  of  firearms  in 
case  of  anti- Jewish  disturbances. 

The  Russian  Government  is  the  first  to 
disapprove  of  such  horrid  acts  of  violence, 
but  it  cannot,  in  compliance  with  the  re¬ 
quests  of  the  Radical  and  revolutionary 
Press,  give  the  Jews  new  rights  of  citizen¬ 
ship,  as  this  is  sure  to  drive  the  Russian 
population  to  new  excesses  against  the 
Jews,  who  are  hated  by  peasants  with  such 
extraordinary  force.’^ 


186 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


A  further  statement  was  made  by  M.  de 
Plehve  to  Mr.  White  *  in  reply  to  a  com- 
munioatiou  calling  his  Excellency’s  atten¬ 
tion  to  the  statement  from  our  Kussian 
correspondents  ”  in  The  Times  of  June  6th, 
that  General  Von  Eaaben,  the  Goyernor  of 
Kishineff,  telegraphed  three  times  to  the 
Minister  of  the  Interior  during  the  riots  for 
permission  to  use  force  before  he  received 
any  reply : 


St.  Petersburg^  June  7  (20). 

The  former  Governor  of  Bessarabia,  the 
General  Von  Eaaben,  had  not,  when  in  office, 
sent  to  the  central  Government  authorities 
any  request  whatever,  asking  for  authorisa¬ 
tion  to  use  force  against  the  Kishineff  mis¬ 
creants.  All  communications  with  the 
Governor  of  Bessarabia  relating  to  the  dis¬ 
turbances  in  Kishineff  were  limited  to  the 
following  proceedings : 

1.  Having  received  in  the  night  on  the  7th 
of  April  a  telegram  announcing  the  out- 
*  The  London  Times ^  June  36,  1903, 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  187 


break  of  disturbances,  the  Minister  of  the 
Interior,  who  was  at  the  time  staying  in 
Moscow,  had  made,  on  the  7th  of  April,  a 
personal  report  of  this  news  to  his  Majesty, 
and  had  received  the  EmperoFs  instructions 
directing  him  to  send  to  the  Governor  von 
Raaben  an  implicit  order  to  put  an  imme¬ 
diate  end  to  the  disturbances  by  any  means 
at  his  disposal,  however  they  may  be  reso¬ 
lute  and  harsh.  The  Minister,  accordingly, 
sent  to  the  Governor  of  Bessarabia  an 
urgent  telegram  giving  this  order. 

2.  The  same  day  the  Minister  of  the  In¬ 
terior,  of  his  own  accord,  sent  to  the 
Governor  of  Bessarabia  another  telegram 
declaring  the  towh  Kishineft  and  its  dis¬ 
trict  in  the  state  of  enforced  security 
(  something  of  a  state  of  siege) ,  and  this  was 
made  in  order  to  give  the  Governor  the 
means  of  inflicting,  by  way  of  administra¬ 
tive  power,  punishment  on  persons  who 
assemble  in  crowds  on  the  streets. 

3.  On  receiving  the  report  of  the  Director 
of  the  Police  Department  who  was  sent  by 


188 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


tlie  Minister  to  Kishineff  in  order  to  investi¬ 
gate  in  person  as  to  the  cause  of  the  dis¬ 
turbances,  and  the  means  taken  to  quell 
them,  and  render  their  recurrence  im¬ 
possible,  the  Minister  of  the  Interior  had 
written  to  the  General  Von  Raaben  a  letter, 
requesting  him  to  dismiss  the  chief  of  the 
town  police  in  Kishineff  for  failing  to  make 
an  effective  use  of  the  power  he  was  invested 
with  as  an  official  responsible  for  the 
security  of  the  town  inhabitants.  And, 
lastly, 

4.  The  Minister  of  the  Interior  had,  by 
telegram,  informed  the  General  Von  Raaben 
that  his  Majesty  had,  for  the  same  reasons, 
ordered  him  to  be  dismissed. 

No  other  communications  had  passed,  on 
the  question  of  the  Kishineff  riots,  between 
the  Minister  of  the  Interior  and  the  Gover¬ 
nor  of  Bessarabia. 


CHAPTER  X 


IV.  AN  IMPARTIAL  ACCOUNT 

IT  will  be  observed  that  M.  de  Plehve 
ignores  altogether  the  part  played  by 
the  Bes Sarah  etz  in  the  period  which  led  up 
to  the  massacres.  He  makes  mention  of 
the  fact  that  he  sent  the  chief  Director  of 
Police  to  investigate  the  origin  of  the  assas¬ 
sinations  and  the  conduct  of  the  officials. 
But  he  omits  all  mention  of  the  petition 
presented  to  the  Director-General  Lopouk- 
hine,  in  behalf  of  the  relations  of  victims, 
in  which  the  responsibility  of  this  paper  was 
clearly  demonstrated  in  no  less  than  thirty- 
five  marked  copies,  handed  to  the  Director- 
General,  cont  aining  in  citations  to  murder 
the  Jews,  and  to  drive  them  from  Russia. 

M.  de  Plehve  next  asserts  that  the 
nearest  cause  of  the  outburst”  was  the 

striking  of  a  Christian  woman  on  Easter 

189 


190 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


Day  in  the  market  place  by  a  Jew  proprie- 
'  tor  of  a  carousing  machine.^’  Here  again 
the  Minister  has  been  badly  informed  by  his 
subordinates. 

I  sought  for  and  found  the  proprietor  of 
this  identical  carousing  machine  ( a  merry- 
go-round  ) .  He  was  not  a  J ew,  but  a  Chris¬ 
tian,  German  by  nationality,  and  Reinhold 
Mergert  by  name.  He  told  me  he  saw  no 
Christian  or  other  woman  struck  by  any 
Jew  on  the  occasion,  while  no  such  act  was 
committed  by  himself  or  anyone  in  his  em¬ 
ployment. 

Had  any  such  injury  been  done  to  a  Chris¬ 
tian  woman  by  a  Jew,  would  the  carousing 
machine  have  been  spared  by  the  mobs  which 
wrecked  seven  hundred  Jewish  homes,  and 
five  or  six  hundred  Jewish  shops  the  same 
day?  Or  would  the  Jew  be  alive  to  tell  the 

story? 

I  saw  this  very  machine  in  full  swing, 
with  its  loads  of  laughing  children,  on 
several  days  during  my  stay  in  the  city. 

«  Workers  then  began  breaking  windows, 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  191 


pulling  down  Jewish  stores,  as  sign  of  pro¬ 
test,’’  continues  M.  de  Plehve,  in  his  official 
explanation. 

My;  information,  gathered  on  the  spot 
from  eye-witnesses — Russian  and  Jewish — 
tells  a  far  different  story.  It  is  this : 

A  few  nights  before  the  outbreak,  mem¬ 
bers  of  the  society  organised  by  the  Bessara- 
hetz,  a  large  number  of  Moldavian  and 
Russian  artisans,  and  several  Seminarists 
and  students,  assembled  in  the  Moscow  ” 
hall.  Speeches  were  made  in  which  it  was 
declared  that  the  Tsar  had  given  permission 
to  kill  Jews  for  a  period  of  three  days,  be¬ 
ginning  on  the  coming  Sunday ! 

The  conveners  of  this  meeting  were  the 
leaders  of  the  mobs  of  Sunday,  April  19th, 
and  Monday,  the  20th. 

That  there  had  been  plan,  premeditation, 
and  organisation  for  all  this,  there  is  not  a 
shadow  of  doubt.  It  was  no  sudden  upris¬ 
ing,  as  M.  de  Plehve  had  been  informed,  but 
a  carefully  prepared  and  officered  arrange¬ 
ment  to  strike  terror  into  the  Jewish 


192  WITHIN  THE  PALE 

Socialists  of  Kishineff,  and,  through  them, 
into  the  alleged  propagandists  of  revolu¬ 
tionary  doctrines  throughout  the  cities  and 
towns  of  the  Pale,  from  Odessa  to  Warsaw. 

One  more  fact  estabUshing  the  case  of 
preparation : 

A  fortnight  before  the  riots  the  band  of 
thirty  Albanians  referred  to  in  Letter  IV 
arrived  in  Kishineff.  They  were  strangers 
and  evil-looking.  They  all  took  part  in  the 
riots,  and  the  mutilations  of  a  child  and  of 
two  of  the  four  Jews  murdered  at  13  Asia 
Street,  Bender  Kogatka  district,  were  the 
work  of  these  imported  brigands.  They 
were  not  imprisoned  after  the  riot.  They 
were  expelled  the  city. 

The  various  bands  of  rioters  referred  to 
above  proceeded  with  absolute  impunity,  in 
presence  of  the  police,  to  destroy  Jewish 
homes  and  smash  and  loot  Jewish  shops, 
until  darkness  set  in,  on  the  Sunday  night. 
In  places  where  Christian  citizens  lived 
among  Hebrews,  a  cross  marked  in  black 
was  found  on  the  front  of  the  house,  or  an 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  193 


ikon  was  displayed  in  a  window.  Not  one 
of  the  dwellings  thus  indicated  as  non- 
Jewish  was  injured.  I  counted  over  a 
hundred  such  houses  marked  and  protected 
in  this  manner  during  my  stay  in  the  city. 
At  the  junction  of  Podolian  Street  and 
Armenian  Street,  looking  out  upon  an  open 
space,  with  a  police  station  forty  paces 
away,  and  a  military  barracks  some  two  or 
three  hundred  yards  distant,  the  Feldstein 
premises  were  in  possession  of  the  looters 
for  fully  five  hours,  owing  to  the  trouble 
they  found  in  breaking  open  Mr.  Feldstein^s 
safe,  where  they  found  fifteen  thousand 
roubles.  All  this  time  police  and  soldiers 
were  in  the  street,  actually  looking  on  at 
the  sport.”  The  looters  were  grateful  for 
this  official  neutrality,  and  brought  up  out 
of  the  Feldstein  cellars  bottles  of  cham¬ 
pagne  which  they  shared  freely  with  the 
officers  of  the  peace  and  a  few  of  the 
soldiers,  one  leader  of  the  gang,  mounting 
the  roof  of  the  saloon,  and  asking  the  crowd 
of  spectators  to  drink  with  him  the  health 


194  WITHIN  THE  PALE  _ 

of  Kroushevan,  the  Editor  of  the  Bessara- 
and  terror  of  the  Jews.^^ 

Before  this  festive  toast  had  been  pro¬ 
posed  the  incident  of  the  meat  tooh  place, 
which  had  such  a  fiendish  infiuence  upon 
the  subsequent  proceedings  of  these  patron¬ 
ised  ruffians.* 

The  attack  on  the  Feldstein  saloon  and 
home  occurred  near  the  dinner  hour,  and 
some  meat  was  being  prepared  for  the 
family  meal.  The  family  fied,  or  rather 
was  rescued  by  a  humane  gendarme,  a  neigh¬ 
bour,  when  the  mob  assailed  the  premises. 
The  rioters  found  the  meat  alluded  to  m  the 
kitchen,  whereupon  the  leader  of  the  band 
fixed  it  upon  the  end  of  his  stick,  mounted 
the  house-top  (a  building  of  one  story), 
and,  holding  up  the  meat  to  the  gaze  of  the 
people  and  police  below,  shouted,  Behold 
the  remains  of  a  Christian  child  which  we 
found  in  the  home  of  the  rich  Jew,  Feld¬ 
stein  ! 

By  eleven  o’clock  that  night  ten  Jews  had 

*  See  Letter  IV. 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  195 


been  murdered,  and  hundreds  of  homes  and 
shops  broken  into  and  looted. 

Over  twenty  thousand  roubles’  worth  of 
costly  wines  was  destroyed  in  the  Feldstein 
premises.  After  eleven  at  night  dozens  of 
vehicles  were  seen  carting  away  goods  and 
property  from  places  visited  by  the  mobs, 
and  articles  of  furniture,  which  had  been 
flung  into  the  streets.  The  vehicles  were 
owned  and  led,  in  every  instance,  by  vir¬ 
tuous  anti-Semites. 

During  all  these  hours  General  Von 
Raaben,  the  Governor,  remained  indoors. 
No  orders  of  any  kind  were  issued  by  him, 
or  by  the  Vice-Governor,  either  to  the  police 
or  military.  The  mobs  were  left  in  pos¬ 
session  of  the  city,  with  not  alone  the  in¬ 
direct  encouragement  by  the  non-action  of 
the  authorities,  in  face  of  assassinations  and 
looting,  but  with  the  knowledge  that  the 
head  of  the  police  of  the  city,  Tchemzenkov, 
or  Baroda,”  as  he  was  popularly  called, 
had  been  seen  driving  round  the  streets 
during  the  day,  smoking,  as  if  thoroughly 


196 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


enjoying  tlie  wliole  infernol  s£Lturn3.1i^  of 
sanguinary  ruffianism. 

Seeing  that  there  was  no  protection 
offered  them  by  the  authorities,  some  Jews 
organised  themselves  during  the  night  of 
Sunday,  and  on  the  sport  being  renewed 
at  eight  on  Monday  morning,  they  gathered, 
to  the  number  of  150,  at  the  New  Bazaar, 
and  easily  drove  away  one  or  two  of  the 
gangs,  one  shot  only  having  been  fired,  which 
infiicted  a  slight  wound  upon  a  rioter. 
Instantly  the  police  and  military  were  on 
the  scene;  the  Jews  were  dispersed,  and 
their  leaders  arrested  and  lodged  in  the 
prison. 

The  deeds  of  Sunday  were  more  than  sur¬ 
passed,  in  character  and  in  number,  on  the 
second  day.  Over  thirty  more  men,  women, 
and  children  were  butchered;  some  of  the 
unfortunate  victims  being  mutilated  in  a 
manner  more  barbarous  than  anything  re¬ 
corded  against  the  customs  of  Africp^n 
savages.  Then,  at  the  hour  of  seven  on 
Monday  evening,  the  city  was  declared  in  a 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  197 


state  of  siege,  and  tlie  military  cleared  the 
centre  of  the  town  of  the  murderous  bands 
in  a  few  moments.  But  only  to  drive  them 
to  the  Bender  Rogatka.,  Skulanska  Rogatka, 
and  other  districts  and  suburbs,  where  they 
sought  out  the  women  and  girls  who  were 
concealed  in  lofts  and  in  other  hiding-places 
the  previous  day. 

It  is  not  possible  to  describe  the  outrages 
perpetrated  during  this  night.  Women  and 
girls  who  went  through  it  all  told  me  their 
stories  in  the  house  of  the  Rabbi  and  else¬ 
where,  and  it  was  impossible  to  doubt  the 
statements  which,  in  depicting  the  infamies 
resorted  to  by  “  Christian  men,  recorded 
their  own  sufferings  and  dishonour. 

One  statement  must,  however,  be  put  on 
record.  A  number  of  women  and  girls, 
some  twenty  in  all,  were  discovered  con¬ 
cealed  in  a  loft  at  No.  11  Nieolaievskai 
Street.  For  four  hours  the  moral  pupils  of 
the  BessarabetZ)  and  of  the  religious  and 
other  colleges  of  Kishineff,  held  their  vic¬ 
tims  in  this  dark  place;  several  of  these 


198 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


being  girls  under  seventeen.  A  married 
woman,  wbo  succeeded,  after  being  violated 
by  six  ruffians,  in  breaking  away  from  her 
captors,  ran  to  the  nearest  police  station, 
and  implored  an  officer  to  rescue  the 
women,  including  her  daughter,  Simme, 
aged  sixteen.  She  was  driven  from  the 
station  and  told  that  “  the  Jews  are  only 
getting  what  they  deserve.’^  The  woman’s 
name  is  Chane  Zeytchik,  and  the  gallant 
officer  in  question  is  one  Maretzky. 

There  were  many  exceptions,  however, 
among  the  police;  the  dictates  of  decent 
humanity  asserting  themselves  where  the 
connivance  of  their  chief  had  outraged  their 
sense  of  moral  manhood.  Among  these  was 
officer  Sloutschevsky,  of  one  of  the  Bender 
Kogatka  streets,  who  with  twelve  men  drove 
a  mob  of  seventy  out  of  his  district.  Several 
artillery  officers  off  duty  also  helped  to  save 
families  and  women.  These  instances  of 
Samaritan  kindness  were  gratefully  men¬ 
tioned  to  me  by  both  men  and  women  who 
had  witnessed  such  acts.  Among  the  com- 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  199 


paratively  few  Christians  who  were  con¬ 
spicuous  in  this  humane  service  were  the 
citizens  Dorianov,  Demtchenks,  Dr.  Doros- 
chevsky,  Dr.  Wolsky,  the  pope  Laschkov, 
and  M.  Georgior,  Many  Russian  women 
also  saved  the  girls  of  their  Jewish  neigh¬ 
bours  by  giving  them  shelter  in  their 
homes. 

The  mobs  were  composed  mainly  of 
Moldavian  and  Russian  workingmen;  the 
former  being  five-sevenths  of  the  whole. 
The  Albanian  contingent  has  already  been 
referred  to.  A  few  Macedonian  refugees, 
and  some  Bulgarians,  were  also  among  the 
gangs.  All  the  accounts  given  to  me  agreed 
in  one  particular- — ^that  the  worst  crimes 
were  the  work  of  the  Moldavians.  In  the 
murders  inside  the  carpenter’s  shed  in  the 
Skulanska  Rogatka  suburb,  all  the  assassins 
were  Moldavians  resident  in  the  very  dis¬ 
trict.  The  sister-in-law  of  little  Feya 
Wouller  *  told  me  that  the  Moldavian  father 

and  son  who  led  the  mob  in  this  work,  and 

*  See  Letter  IV. 


200 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


in  the  murder  of  her  husband,  who  tried  to 
save  his  little  sister,  were  walking  about 
free  during  my  stay  in  Kishinetf,  having 
been  released  from  prison  after  a  few  days’ 
detention. 

A  brace  of  other  assassins,  a  car-driver 
and  his  son,  w^ho  were  concerned  in  no  less 
than  four  murders,  were  pointed  out  to  me 
in  the  streets ! 

One  feature  of  the  massacres  is  most 
significant,  and  is  not  mentioned  by  M.  de 
Plehve  in  his  official  account,  namely:  All 
the  Jews  who  were  killed,  with  one  excep¬ 
tion,  were  workingmen,  regular  or  casual; 
carpenters,  masons,  smiths,  clerks,  and  a 
few  very  poor  jobbing  dealers.  The  excep¬ 
tion  was  one  Galantor,  a  cattle  dealer,  who 
was  known  to  have  fifteen  thousand  roubles 
in  his  possession.  He  was  assassinated  and 
robbed  by  the  driver  and  his  son  alluded  to 
above. 

The  women  and  girls  who  suffered  were 
the  wives  and  daughters  of  Jewish  artisans. 
Those  females  who  were  killed  were  also, 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  201 


like  the  male  victims,  of  the  same  class.  A 
few  young  ladies  of  richer  families  suffered 
too,  but  their  names,  for  obvious  reasons, 
were  not  made  known  to  their  families.  No 
rich  Jews  were  killed  or  wounded. 

The  leaders  of  the  gangs,  in  almost  every 
instance,  were  Seminarists,  disguised  as 
workingmen.  There  were  two  students 
from  Odessa,,  sons  of  wealthy  Kishineff 
families,  prominent  among  the  captains  of 
the  mobs;  but  to  the  seminaries  of  the  city 
belonged  the  shame  and  dishonour  of  having 
contributed  mostly  all  the  directors,  guides, 
and  active  instigators  of  the  two-days’ 
carnival  of  crime,  lust,  and  looting.  Em¬ 
ployes  of  the  post  office  and  telegraph  de¬ 
partments  were  along  among  the  rioters, 
but  chiefly  for  loot. 

Among  the  organisers  of  the  plot,  but  not 
in  the  actual  execution  of  it,  were  a  notary 
of  the  city,  an  engineer,  a  well-known 
wealthy  citizen,  two  minor  officers,  two  sons 
of  a  rich  merchant,  and  members  of  the  staff 
of  the  Bessarahet^. 


202 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


None  of  these  had  been  arrested  when  I 
left  Kishineff,  on  the  30th  of  May  last. 

The  question  of  official  responsibility  has 
been  raised,  and  a  circular  alleged  to  have 
been  issued  by  M.  de  Plehve  has  been  pub¬ 
lished  which  would  tend  to  connect  the 
Minister  of  the  Interior  with  an  intimate 
knowledge  of  the  intended  outbreak.  No 
one  in  Kishineffi  with  whom  I  came  in  con¬ 
tact  knew  of  any  such  circular.  Charges  of 
complicity  were  freely  made  against  the 
Government  by  many  leading  Jews,  but  no 
proofs  of  any  kind  were  adduced.  These 
charges  were  entirely  based  upon  the  culpa¬ 
ble  inaction  of  Governor  Von  Kaaben, 
and  the  all  but  active  participation  of 
the  head  of  the  City  Police  in  the  riots, 
along  with  the  well-known  anti-Semitic 
record  and  feeling  of  the  Vice-Governor, 
Ostrogoff. 

Official  responsibility  might  be  deduced 
from  these  facts,  but  I  failed  to  discover  any 
evidence,  outside  these  circumstances,  which 
could  even  indirectly  bring  home  to  the 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  203 


Government  the  charge  of  guilty  connivance 
in  the  Bessarabetz  plot. 

The  Governor  was,  beyond  all  doubt,  the 
person  most  to  blame  for  the  crimes  which 
were  allowed  to  disgrace  the  capital  of  his 
province  and  a  civilised  city  during  two 
whole  days.  And  he  was  forewarned  in 
time  of  what  was  coming. 

Ten  days  before  Easter  he  was  waited 
upon  by  leading  Jewish  citizens  and  his 
attention  called  to  the  incendiary  appeals 
of  the  Bessarabetz,  in  connection  with  the 
murder  of  the  boy  at  Doubossar.  General 
Von  Raaben  assured  them  that  they  need 
not  dread  any  disturbance,  as  he  would  not 
hesitate  to  employ  all  the  military  force  at 
his  disposal  in  order  to  preserve  law  and 
order.  He  fulfilled  this  promise  on  Easter 
Sunday  and  Monday  by  refusing  to  leave 
his  house  during  the  forty-eight  hours  in 
which  the  slaughter  of  forty-five  victims  of 
the  anti-Semitic  crusade  was  carried  out. 

It  has  been  alleged  that  the  Governor,  on 
realising  the  gravity  of  the  first  day^s  events. 


204 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


wired  to  St.  Petersburg  for  authority  to  de¬ 
clare  a  state  of  siege.  This  I  believe  to  be 
untrue.  M.  de  Plehve^s  explicit  state¬ 
ments,  as  given  in  his  second  communica¬ 
tion  to  Mr.  Arnold  White,  dispose  of  this 
allegation.  In  face  of  the  clear  language 
of  the  Criminal  Code  it  would  be  an  absurd 
and  unnecessary  proceeding  on  the  part  of 
the  Governor. 

Clause  340  of  this  Code,  and  Clauses  1 
and  8  of  the  supplement  to  Section  316,  of 
Vol.  II.,  give,  I  am  informed,  the  fullest 
powers  to  the  administration  of  any  prov¬ 
ince  or  city  to  take  all  necessary  measures 
for  quelling  riots  or  disturbances  which 
threaten  to  become  a  menace  to  life  or 
property.  There  could,  therefore,  be  no 
excuse  or  ambiguity  in  the  language  of  the 
law  necessitating  such  a  message,  as  that 
alleged,  to  the  central  Government.  What 
happened,  in  all  probability,  was  this : 
Someone  in  lower  authority,  seeing  the 
criminal  neglect  of  the  Governor  in  presence 
of  such  a  situation  as  was  developed  on 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  205 


Monday  morning,  may  have  telegraphed  to 
M.  de  Plehve  an  account  of  what  was  tak¬ 
ing  place.  This  would  necessarily  have  to 
be  verified,  in  reply  to  messages  from  the 
Minister,  and  in  this  way,  as  he  relates  in 
his  despatch  to  Mr.  Arnold  White,  he 
ordered  martial  law  to  be  proclaimed  on 
Monday  evening;  unfortunately  after  most 
of  the  murders  and  other  outrages  had  been 
committed. 

In  an  official  sense  only  M.  de  Plehve  is 
answerable  for  the  conduct  of  his  subor¬ 
dinates,  as  all  Ministers  are,  under  similar 
circumstances,  even  in  constitutionally 
gcverned  countries;  but  without  evidence, 
which  has  not  yet  been  forthcoming  from 
any  quarter,  I  refuse  to  credit  accusations  of 
direct  cognisance  of,  or  complicity  in,  the 
plot  which  owed  its  origin  to  the  incitations 
of  a  powerful  local  paper ;  its  plan  and  pur¬ 
pose  to  local  anti-Semites;  and  in  the 
execution  of  which  several  minor  officials  of 
the  local  administration,  some  police  offi¬ 
cers,  employes  of  public  departments,  stu- 


206 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


dents,  Seminarists,  and  Moldavian  and 
Russian  artisans  were  notoriously  engaged. 
In  character  it  was  a  savage  anti-Semitic 
outbreak,  and  in  purpose  a  terrorising  dem¬ 
onstration  against  the  Jews  as  advocates 
of  Socialism  and  suspected  enemies  of  the 
Tsar^s  Government. 

M,  de  Plehve^s  borrowed  version  of  the 
origin  and  objects  of  the  outbreak  is  the 
concoction  of  incriminated  local  officials, 
and  members  of  the  Bessarahetz  staff.  It 
is  therefore,  and  on  that  account,  prejudiced 
and  untrue. 


CHAPTER  XI 


V.  DOCUMENTS 

(I)  Petition  addressed  hy  the  Jews  of 
Kishineff  to  the  Director-General  of  the 
Police  Department  sent  from  St*  Peters¬ 
burg  by  M.  de  Plehve  to  investigate  the 
causes  of  the  massacres* 

To  His  Excellency  the  Director  of  the 

Police  Department  : 

We,  tile  numerous  Jewish  inhabitants  of 
the  town  of  Kishineff,  having  suffered  from 
an  inhuman  and  sanguinary  outburst  which 
resulted  in  unprecedented  plundering  on 
the  part  of  an  unrestrained  mob  on  the  6th 
and  7th  (19th  and  20th)  of  April,  perceive 
in  the  arrival  of  your  Excellency  into  our 
town  an  unmistakable  sign  that  the  Su¬ 
preme  Government  takes  an  interest  in  the 
causes  responsible  for  the  sad  event,  and 

in  the  conditions  which  made  the  occur* 

207 


208 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


Fences  assume  such  terrible  proportions. 
In  this  case  we,  the  Jewish  population  of 
the  town  of  Kishineff,  are  convinced  that 
your  Excellency  will  not  refuse  to  listen 
to  our  complaints  as  sufferers. 

It  is  impossible,  in  our  opinion,  to  attrib¬ 
ute  the  caiises  of  the  present  outbreak  to 
the  economical  exploitation  of  the  Chris¬ 
tians  by  the  Jewish  inhabitants.  Hitherto 
there  has  been  no  friction  between  Jews  and 
Christians,  in  Bessarabia  in  general  and  in 
Kishineff  in  particular.  This  state  of 
affairs  is  explained  partly  by  the  peaceful 
character  of  the  local  population,  partly  by 
the  favourable  economic  condition  of  the 
province.  The  result  has  been  that  for  the 
last  twenty  years  there  has  been  no  collision 
whatever  between  the  two  groups  of  the 
population  in  the  province  of  Bessarabia; 
and  whilst  in  the  South  and  Southwest  of 
Russia  several  outbreaks  against  the  Jews 
have  occurred,  peace  and  order  reigned  at 
Kishineff. 

When  in  the  eighties  the  whole  South  was 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  209 


ablaze  with  attacks  against  the  Jews,  not  a 
single  spark  found  its  way  into  Bessarabia. 
During  all  those  years  the  province  suffered 
on  several  occasions  from  failure  of  crops, 
and  yet  the  Christians  never  thought  of  at¬ 
tributing  the  cause  of  economical  troubles 
to  their  Jewish  neighbours.  The  present 
year,  following  upon  a  very  good  one  for 
Bessarabia,  could  offer  no  reason  whatever 
for  hostile  feelings  between  Jews  and  Chris¬ 
tians  on  economical  ground. 

We  are  therefore  of  opinion  that  the 
economical  question  must  be  entirely  ex¬ 
cluded  from  a  consideration  of  the  recent 
massacres.  Not  only  does  the  rich  and 
fertile  province  of  Bessarabia  secure  an 
easy  existence  for  every  kind  of  work,  but 
it  is  also  quite  free  from  the  vagabond  ele¬ 
ment  of  the  rabble  in  seaports,  from  whom 
the  rioters  are  usually  recruited.  The  re¬ 
cent  outbreaks,  unequalled  even  in  the  his¬ 
tory  of  attacks  on  the  Jews,  are  so  entirely 
out  of  harmony  with  the  usual  social  life 
and  habits  of  the  province,  that  we  must 


210 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


necessarily  look  for  the  reasons  not  in  the 
relations  existing  between  Jews  and  Chris¬ 
tians,  but  in  special  events  which  have  taken 
place  during  the  last  few  years,  and  in  cer¬ 
tain  occurrences  immediately  preceding  the 
outbreak.  Among  such  events  we  count, 
in  the  first  instance,  the  influence  of  the 
local  press,  the  only  representative  of  which 
is  the  Bessarabetz,  This  paper  has  been 
established  for.  over  five  years.  Before  its 
existence  there  was  no  local  organ  in  the 
province  (with  the  exception  of  the  short¬ 
lived  Bessarabsky  Yiestnik).  Thus  the 
Bessarabetz  was  bound  to  begin  its  activity 
upon  virgin  soil,  and  its  influence  was,  for 
this  very  reason,  considerable  from  the  com¬ 
mencement.  In  the  second  year  of  its 
existence  the  paper  began  a  systematic 
campaign  of  J ew-baiting,  which  took  a  much 
more  monstrous  form  than  that  in  any  other 
paper.  The  Bessarabetz  evidently  made  a 
special  feature  of  Jew-baiting.  We  could 
quote  articles  which  plainly  incite  the  mob 
to  exterminate  the  Jews.  The  local  popula- 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  211 


tion,  with  only  one  paper,  the  Bessarahetz, 
at  its  disposal,  the  Censor  having  refused 
to  authorise  another  organ,  were  told  day 
day  that  the  J ews  are  enemies/^  and 
that  the  Jeivs  must  he  destroy edP 
The  local  Censor,  in  the  person  of  the 
administrative  power,  evidently  found  such 
a  tendency  useful  from  some  other  point  of 
view,  otherwise  his  attitude  remains  quite 
incomprehensible.  It  naturally  followed 
that  the  average  reader,  and  especially  the 
half-educated  mass,  had  in  the  end  to  adopt 
the  views  of  the  press  which  told  them  that 
the  extermination  of  the  Jews  was  not  only 
desirable  but  also  possible.  This  is  one 
phase  of  the  state  of  affairs, — the  prepara¬ 
tory  stage,  consisting  in  the  endeavour  to 
influence  the  local  population  towards  one 
end  and  in  one  particular  direction.  The 
absence  of  any  other  local  organs,  the  at¬ 
titude  of  the  Censor,  and  the  daily  activity 
of  several  individuals  under  the  leadership 
of  the  editor  of  the  Bessarahetz^  helped  for¬ 
ward  the  movement.  There  is  hardly  a 


212 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


number  of  the  paper  which  did  not  contain 
an  attack  on  the  Jews.  Phrases  like 

death  to  the  Jews/’  all  the  Jews  must  he 
killed/’  were  suggested  regularly  as ,  the 
means  of  solving  the  Jewish  question. 
Being  the  only  local  organ  the  Bessarahetz 
is  read  in  all  the  taverns  and  teashops,  and 
it  is  evident  to  what  an  extent  this  paper 
could  foster  the  hatred  of  the  Christians 
towards  the  Jews  and  how  all-pervading  its 
influence  upon  the  passions  of  human  na¬ 
ture  must  have  been. 

In  order  to  convince  his  readers  o-f  the 
necessity  o'f  solving  the  Jewish  question, 
especially  in  the  spirit  advocated  by  the 
paper,  the  editor  of  the  Bessarahetz  availed 
himself  of  the  circumstances,  inexplicable 
at  the  beginning,  attending  the  murder  of  a 
lad  living  in  Doubossar.  As  insinuatingly 
as  possible  he  attributed  the  disappearance 
of  the  lad  to  ritual  murder  by  the  Jews,  and 
to  the  alleged  requirement  of  Christian 
blood.  The  official  denial  of  the  accusation 
by  the  competent  judicial  authorities  was 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  213 


purposely  worded  in  such  a  way  as  to  be 
only  half  convincing. 

All  these  circumstances,  together  with  the 
general  attitude  of  the  Bessarahetz,  could 
not  but  create  such  a  state  of  mind  in  the 
mob  that  one  stone  thrown  into  a  Jewish 
window  was  sufficient  to  call  forth  a  regular 
attack.  We  are  unable  to  trace  the  source 
whence  came  the  circulars  read  in  the 
taverns  and  according  to  which :  the  Tsar 
had  ordered  the  extermination  of  the  Jews 
during  the  three  days  of  Easter.” 

We  must,  however,  remark  that  under  the 
conditions  existing,  it  was  impossible  for 
themob  not  to  consider  these  circulars  as  the 
logical  sequel  to  the  campaign  of  the  Bes- 
sarahetz  extending  over  a  course  of  years. 

If  we  now  turn  to  the  lesson  which  the 
population  of  Kishinev  could  take  from  the 
action  of  the  local  administrative  authori¬ 
ties  towards  the  Jews,  we  see  that  the  mass 
could  not  but  come  to  the  conclusion  that 
what  was  unlawful  with  regard  to  any  other 
section  of  the  inhabitants,  was  legal  and 


214 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


permissible  where  Jews  were  concerned. 
These  acts  include  the  expulsion  of  Jews 
from  various  localities,  subsequently  recog¬ 
nised  as  unjust  by  the  Senate;  and  the 
actions  of  individuals,  as,  for  instance,  the 
Pristav  Von  Oglio. 

The  Jewish  population,  becoming  aware 
long  before  the  festivals  of  the  attitude  of 
the  crowd  and  of  the  dangers  that  threatened 
them,  addressed  themselves  through  their 
representatives  to  the  Governor  of  the  prov¬ 
ince,  and  asked  him  to  take  the  necessary 
measures  to  protect  them  and  their  property. 
The  Governor  gave  them  a  reply  of  a  very 
assuring  nature,  relying  upon  which  the 
Jews  considered  it  needless  to  think  of  self- 
defence. 

Under  these  circumstances  the  Easter 
festival  approached  with  danger  feared  by 
all  the  population.  It  was  talked  of 
publicly  and  openly;  it  was  no  secret  even 
to  the  authorities.  Strangely  enough,  how¬ 
ever,  not  only  did  the  local  government  take 
no  preparatory  measures  against  a  possible 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  215 


outbreak,  but  even  when  the  attack  began  it 
neglected  to  take  the  steps  within  its  power 
which  would  have  prevented  the  massacres 
from  assuming  unheard-of  proportions,  and 
of  which  it  is  impossible  to  speak  without 
feelings  of  horror  and  pity.  Before  the  very 
eyes  of  the  police  almost  incredible  havoc 
was  worked  upon  human  victims,  and  cruel¬ 
ties  committed  unequalled  in  the  history  of 
Russia  during  the  past  few  decades.  The 
military  power  remained  inactive  and,  for 
reasons  altogether  incomprehensible,  the 
local  government  did  not  avail  itself  of  the 
rights  and  privileges  accorded  to  it  in  such 
cases  by  the  §  340  of  the  Criminal  Code  and 
by  §  1  and  §  8  of  the  additions  to  §  316. 
Remaining  unmoved  itself,  it  kept  inactive 
the  military  forces  and  thus  encouraged  the 
mob.  The  latter,  perceiving  the  passive  at¬ 
titude  of  the  authorities,  soon  ceased  break¬ 
ing  the  windows  and  took  to  sacking  houses 

and  shops,  and  finally  to  murder  and  viola¬ 
tion. 

In  their  complaints  addressed  by  the  suf- 


216 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


ferers  to  tlie  public  prosecutor,  they  pointed 
to  cases  where  the  police  encouraged  the 
rioters  by  the  words:  Kill  the  Jews!’’ 
(Byei  Zhidoff!).  Jews  who  had  armed 
themselves  in  self-defence  were  soon  dis¬ 
armed  by  the  police.  The  result  of  such  an 
unheard-of  state  of  affairs  has  been  the  loss 
of  45  lives,  with  86  dangerously  wounded 
and  500  slightly  wounded,  and  the  violation 
of  women  and  children — in  a  word,  ail  the 
horrors  of  a  massacre. 

It  is  not  astonishing  that  when  some  of 
the  rioters  were  arrested  they  expressed  sur¬ 
prise,  asking :  Why  they  were  being  ar¬ 
rested,  since  it  had  been  permitted  to  kill 
the  Jews?”  There  was  an  instance  in  which 
the  mob  was  engaged  over  eight  hours  plun¬ 
dering  one  house,  situated  in  a  populous 
street,  without  being  stopped,  although  the 
sufferers  applied  for  help  to  all  the  authori¬ 
ties.  Only  towards  five  o’clock  in  the  after¬ 
noon  of  the  7th  (20th)  of  April,  when  the 
military  were  called  upon  to  check  the  riot, 
did  the  rabble  cease  its  terrible  work 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  217 


The  horrors  and  crimes  committed  have 
brought  about  a  state  of  things  which,  offer¬ 
ing  no  guarantee  as  far  as  life  and  property 
are  concerned,  prevents  the  inhabitants 
from  resuming  their  peaceful  occupations. 
The  people,  deprived  of  their  homes  and 
property,  are  trembling  for  their  lives.  The 
losses  cannot  be  exactly  estimated,  but  they 
amount  to  several  millions  of  roubles,  and 
the  fire  that  has  broken  out  in  Kishineff  is 
spreading  all  over  the  province.  The  Jewish 
population  therefore  trusts  that  your  Ex¬ 
cellency  will  restore  order  and  tranquillity 
and  protect  the  Jewish  inhabitants  from 
the  dangers  threatening  their  lives  and 
property.  The  arrival  of  your  Excellency 
into  our  town  has  already  inspired  us  with 
the  hope  that  definite  and  energetic  meas¬ 
ures  will  be  taken. 

(H)  of  the  killed  oMd  those  that 
died  from  tcounds  in  the  Hospital. 

1.  Seltzer,  Michel  Josiphov. 

2.  Makhlin,  Moses  Chaskelev,  45  years. 


218 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


Asia  Street,  No.  13,  killed  by  a  bootmaker; 
his  daughter  was  also  killed;  murderers 
armed  with  hammers. 

3.  Berladsky,  Hosea  Abramovitz,  Asia 
Street,  No.  13,  had  hidden  himself  in  the 
attic,  and  was  thrown  into  the  street. 

4.  Kainarsky,  Kopel  Davidovitz,  60  years 
old.  His  grandsons  know  the  murderer. 
The  sons  are  in  the  hospital.  Kainarsky 
was  killed  in  the  slaughter-house;  he  lived 
in  the  Mountzeskaya  road.  His  money  was 
taken  from  him  and  his  abdomen  was  opened 
and  filled  with  feathers. 

5.  Tounik,  Jacob  Elchunov,  killed  in  his 
own  house. 

6.  Kogan,  Abraham  Koutor,  killed  in 
the  slaughter-house;  was  a  dealer  in 
fowls. 

7.  Menduk,  Mottel  Davidovitz,  shop¬ 
keeper  in  the  Mountzeskaya  Street,  killed  in 
the  slaughter-house  in  the  stables;  wife  and 
children  in  Berlin  (?)  in  very  poor  circum¬ 
stances. 

8.  Ullman,  Israel  Yacoblewitz,  wine-shop 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  219 


proprietor  near  the  botanical  gardens ;  wife 
and  children  in  Berlin. 

9.  Shalistal,  Israel  Leiservitz. 

10.  Baranovitz,  Benja  Shimenov,  lived  in 
Gostinaya  Street,  No.  33.  With  him  in  the 
same  house  8  men  were  killed. 

11.  Fanarnei,  Eiss  Davidovitz  (?) ;  lived 
near  the  slaughter-house.  The  daughter 
Fliga  is  in  the  hospital,  and  is  ignorant  of 
the  father^s  death. 

12.  Salapter,  Ben-zion  Leibov,  lived  in 
Gostinaya  Street,  No.  33;  killed;  the  roof 
was  torn  off  by  the  mob  who  killed Galantor, 
cattle  dealer,  and  robbed  him  of  1500  rou¬ 
bles,  and  others  with  clubs. 

13.  Goldiss,  Chaim  Leibov. 

14.  Chaskelevitz,  David  Nisselev,  smith; 
killed  together  with  his  grandmother.  His 
sister,  12  years  old  (violated),  has  since 
died  in  the  hospital. 

15.  Wouller,  Leinha;  married,  no  chil¬ 
dren  ;  killed  defending  his  sister  Feya,  aged 
13,  who  was  violated  and  killed;  wife  now 
at  home. 


220 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


16.  Liss,  Hirsch  Yankelev,  killed  in  the 
courtyard ;  lived  at  the  corner  of  Gostinaya 
Street,  No.  2 ;  dealer  in  bread,  etc.  Son  was 
in  the  hospital,  student  of  the  commercial 
school. 

17.  Krupnik,  Idel;  lived  in  Krovskaya 
Street,  No.  52. 

18.  Krupnik,  Isaac,  son  of  the  former. 

19.  Drachmann,  David  Moisuv;  baker, 
worked  in  the  bakery  of  Silberstein. 

20.  Greenspoon,  Mordecai ;  killed  witlf  a 
knife.  The  murderers  mutilated  the  body. 

21.  Byeletzky,  Isaac  David  Mendelev. 

22.  Kantor,  Joseph  Abramovitz;  joiner, 
lived  in  Gostinaya  Street,  No.  33,  28  years 
old,  married. 

23. .  Bolgar,  Hirsch  Chaimov ;  commission 
agent  at  the  railway  station;  killed  in  the 
courtyard;  married,  8  children. 

24.  Nissenson,  Chaim  Nissinov,  formerly 
a  bookeeper.  Died  in  the  hospital  the  fol¬ 
lowing  day,  in  consequence  of  blows  received 
on  the  head  with  clubs ;  he  was  in  a  terrible 
state. 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  221 


25.  Urrmanii,  Samuel  Baruch,  died  in 
the  hospital. 

26.  Weinstein,  Abraham;  bootmaker,  47 
years  old ;  died  in  the  hospital. 

27.  Kiegel,  Moshe  Samuel;  lived  in  Is- 
mailoYsk  Street,  shopkeeper,  27  years  old; 
married,  no  children. 

28.  Brachmann,  Aaron  Isaacov;  his  wife 
is  now  in  the  hospital, 

29.  Rosenfeld,  Isaac  Yankelev. 

30.  Greenberg,  Joseph  Hirsch  Danilov. 
Lived  in  Nicolaievskai  Street,  No.  33. 

31.  Oharidon,  David  Abrahamov,  brought 
in  a  box  (to  hospital  or  cemetery?)  with 
parts  of  his  body  cut  off ;  single. 

32.  Kodja  (?),  Bella  Leiserovna. 

33.  Katzap,  Rose  Falikovna;  lived  in 
Gostinaya  Street,  No.  33;  killed  in  the 
yard ;  lived  with  her  son. 

34.  Papagei  (?),  Ghaja  Sarah  Abram¬ 
ovna. 

35.  Berger,  Itlia,  52  years  old ;  had  come 
on  a  visit  to  Kishineff. 

36.  Spivak,  Pinya  Isaacov. 


222 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


37.  Fishmann,  Simeon;  6  months  old; 
smothered  whilst  the  mother  defended  her¬ 
self. 

38.  Michel  Shaev  Lashkoff. 

39.  Wolowitz,  Kalmann,  60  years  old; 
died  in  the  hospital. 

40.  Kiegelmann,  Chaya  Leah,  38  years 
old,  died  in  the  hospital ;  daughter  employed 
in  the  free  reading  room  in  the  professional 
school. 

[This  list  is  not  complete.  It  was  prob¬ 
ably  prepared  soon  after  the  massacres^  A 
few  dead  bodies  have  been  found  since  the 
first  lists  were  compiled. — M.  D.] 

(Ill)  Extracts  from  a  report  upon  the 
outrages  hy  two  Christian  ladies. 

Seltzer.  Gostinaya  Street,  No.  75.  His 
daughter  rushed  to  the  police  station,  ask¬ 
ing  for  help.  The  police  replied :  We  shall 
do  nothing.”  The  father  escaped,  but  was 
caught  by  the  crowd  and  killed ;  the  police¬ 
man  who  took  him  to  the  hospital  trampled 
him  under  his  feet. 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  223 

The  Jews  assembled  on  Monday,  and 

armed  themselves  in  self-defence,  but  the 

police  officer,  Dobroselsky,  ordered  them  to 
disarm. 

Makhlin.  Asiatskaya  Street,  No.  13. 
Whilst  the  crowd  was  at  its  murderous 
work  in  this  place,  the  Jews  addressed  them¬ 
selves  to  the  military,  asking  for  help.  The 
reply  was:  “We  have  no  orders.”  About 
300  Jews  assembled  near  the  barracks,  when 
suddenly  a  drunken  sergeant  (feldwebel) 
rushed  in,  calling  out  to  the  Jews :  “  Dogs, 

I  shall  kill  all  of  you.”  The  Jews  rushed 

away ,  frightened,  and  fell  into  the  hands 
of  the  mob. 

Makhlin,  Berladsky,  Greenspoon,  and 
Nissenson  were  killed. 

The  daughter  of  Berladsky  was  thrown 
down  from  the  attic. 

The  daughter  of  Makhlin  had  the  skin  of 
her  finger  tom  off,  together  with  the  rings. 

Greenspoon.  ( The  following  is  told  by  his 
wife.)  She  had  hidden  herself,  together 
With  two  little  children  and  a  neighbour,  in 


224 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


a  shed.  When  her  husband  was  being 
beaten  in  the  yard  she  rushed  out  to  defend 
him,  but  one  ruffian  struck  the  child  in  the 
face  and  pushed  her  back  into  the  shed.  She 
found  the  dead  body  of  her  husband  only  on 
the  following  morning,  in  a  neighbouring 
yard.  In  the  same  house  there  were  wine 
vaults,  and  the  crowd  drank,  shouted,  and 
danced  upon  the  corpses. 

Myntsheskaya  Koad.  Forty  families 
lived  here. 

Munduk. 

Meier  Weismann. 

Kogan,  Abraham,  was  running  towards 
the  town  to  save  himself,  when  he  was 
caught  by  the  crowd  and  struck  upon  the 
head.  His  wife,  who  was  with  him,  was 
caught  by  fifteen  men,  who  violated  her,  in 
the  open  road,  one  after  the  other.  A  daugh¬ 
ter,  22  years  old,  and  two  sons,  16  and  18 
years  old,  were  wounded,  and  when  they 
sought  refuge  in  the  house  of  a  retired  Col¬ 
onel,  who  was  cashier  in  the  gut-works,  he 
refused  to  shelter  them,  A  converted  Jew 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  225 

showed  equal  cruelty  with  regard  to  the 
victims. 

Israel  Ullmann.  When,  the  crowd  left 
him,  thinking  he  was  dead,  his  little  son 
came,  crying:  “  Father,  father!  ”  Ullmann 
lifted  up  his  head,  and  some  of  the  Christian 
onlookers  shouted :  “  Ullmann  is  still  alive.” 
The  murderers  returned  and  finished  him. 

Fanorissi  Siss  and  his  wife.  The  wife 
had  nails  driven  through  her  eyes. 

Ohariton. 

Kainarsky. 

Baronowitz,  Gostinaya  Street,  No.  33. 
Whilst  the  crowd  was  breaking  the  win¬ 
dows,  the  Assistant  Police  Officer  passed, 
but  took  no  notice  of  what  was  happening. 
The  officer  Goresonsky  passed  afterwards 
and  showed  the  same  indifference.  The  son 
of  Baronowitz  hid  himself  in  the  closet;  the 
crowd  tore  off  the  roof  and  killed  him. 

hen  the  father  saw  that  the  son  was  being 
killed,  he  wept  and  begged  the  murderers 
to  take  everything,  but  to  spare  his  son.  The 
murderers  replied;  Be  quiet,  Jew;  we 


226 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


shall  soon  do  the  same  to  you/’  Whilst 
he  was  endeavouring  to  save  the  other 
children  he  was  dragged  hack  into  the 
yard. 

Baronowitz  fell  on  his  knees  before  the 
officer  Solovkin,  kissed  his  hands,  and  told 
him  that  his  son  had  been  killed.  Well,” 
said  the  officer,  don’t  worry;  it  is  all  over 
now  in  your  house,  they  will  harm  you  no 
more.” 

Drachmann.  Gostinaya  Street,  No.  33. 

Skyljanskaya  Rogatka.  When  the  Jews 
went  to  the  police  station  to  ask  for  help, 
the  inspector  replied :  Serves  you  right, 
why  do  you  use  our  blood?  ” 

A  little  girl  of  ten  years,  having  begged 
the  officer  Osovsky  to  protect  her  from  the 
murderers,  the  officer  replied :  Go  away, 
you  Jewish  brat.” 

Kiegelmann,  killed ;  wife  died  in  the  hos¬ 
pital.  A  son  and  a  daughter,  18  years  old, 
defended  themselves,  when  six  ruffians 
seized  the  girl  by  the  hair,  dragged  her  out 
into  the  yard,  and  attempted  to  violate  her. 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  227 


She  fought  desperately,  defending  her 
honour,  her  clothes  were  torn  off  her  bodv, 
but  at  last  the  ruffians  l6ft  bor.  ThG  mother 
rushed  to  the  daughter's  assistance,  but  was 
severely  injured. 

Weinstein,  The  wife  was  ill  (she  has 
died  since)  in  bed.  The  crowd,  led  by  some 
Government  officials,  came  into  the  house 
and  beat  the  husband  until  he  fell  down 
bleeding  and  motionless.  The  little  chil¬ 
dren  defended  the  bedridden  mother.  One 
little  girl,  10  years  old,  having  thrown  her 
arms  round  her  mother,  had  her  arm  cut 
off ;  another  daughter  and  her  intended  had 
their  teeth  broken,  and  their  lips  cut  off. 
The  murderers  were  two  peasants  'whom 
they  knew  well,  and  who  used  to  be  on  very 
good  terms  with  the  family.  They  left  the 
house  shouting:  Where  are  Itzko  and  Is¬ 
rael  [two  sons],  we  shall  kill  them.” 

Volowitz.  Killed;  one  daughter  danger¬ 
ously  wounded;  she  begged  the  murderers 
to  kill  her  together  with  her  father.  A 
younger  daughter  rushed  into  the  streets, 


228 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


imploring  the  military  for  help,  but  the 
officer  took  no  notice  of  her. 

Alexandrovskaya  Street,  No.  37.  Holder 
hid  himself  in  the  cellar,  having  with  him  a 
child  2  years  old.  There  he  passed  the 
night.  The  child,  ih  consequence  of  the 
cold,  died  the  next  day. 

Fishmon,  Solomon.  The  crowd  was  led 
by  several  men,  evidently  belonging  to  the 
better  class  of  society.  The  wife  of  F.  tried 
to  escape,  holding  in  her  arms  a  child  10 
months  old,  when  somebody  struck  her  in 
the  back  so  violently  that  she  fell,  and  in 
her  fall  smothered  the  infant  with  her  own 
body. 

Not  far  away  from  the  scene  of  the  mur¬ 
der,  the  Superintendent  of  the  Police,  the 
Pristav  Solovkin,  and  the  patrol  were  look¬ 
ing  on  quietly  and  unmoved. 

A  Christian  boy  of  about  15  jumped  upon 
a  tram,  asking :  Are  there  no  Jews  here? 
There  was  only  one  Jewish  woman  whose 
husband  had  just  been  killed,  and  who, 
tremblingly,  managed  to  hide  herself  behind 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  229 


her  neighbour,  a  Christian  woman.  At  last 
the  reply  was  given :  No  Jews  here.’^  Then 
a  gentleman,  well  dressed,  having  a  hat  on, 
and  with  rings  on  his  fingers,  asked  the 
boy:  ^^Well,  how  goes  it?’^  “Very  well,’^ 
replied  the  youth.  “  By  the  evening  we 
shall  have  killed  all  the  Jews.’’  The  gentle¬ 
man  encouragingly  patted  the  boy  on  the 
cheek. 

The  Superintendent  of  the  Police  visited 
the  crowd  on  the  first  day  of  Easter,  ad¬ 
dressed  a  few  words  to  them,  and  went  away. 
The  crowds  shouted :  “  Hurray,  bravo !  ”  and 
at  once  began  breaking  the  windows. 

Elie  Mutshnik  and  150  Jews  came  on  the 
first  day  of  the  riots  to  the  Vice-Governor 
to  ask  for  help.  The  latter  ordered  the 
soldiers  to  disperse  them. 

Whilst  the  crowd  of  rioters  was  attacking 
a  family  in  which  there  were  little  children, 
a  lady,  passing  by,  said  to  her  husband,  a 
Government  official,  that  she  was  sorry  for 
the  children.  “  Never  mind,”  said  her  hus¬ 
band,  “  let  them  get  their  reward.”  An  eye- 


230 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


witness  says  that  the  military  and  the  police 
refused  to  help  the  victims,  and  coolly 
looked  on  whilst  houses  were  sacked,  and 
men  and  women  killed. 

In  Asiatskaya  passage  (Perenlok)  all  the 
houses  were  destroyed,  and  many  women 
violated. 

Among  the  rioters  were  women,  girls,  stu¬ 
dents  of  the  seminary,  government  offi¬ 
cials,*  and  some  belonging  to  the  better 
classes. 

*  “  Government  officials  ”  here  would  stand  for  telegraph 
messengers,  or  employes  of  other  departments.-— M.  D. 


CHAPTER  XII 


NOTES  AND  COMMENTS 

There  is  another  anti-Semite  organ 
edited  by  Pavolachi  Kroushevan.  It  is 
named  the  Znamya,  or  Standard-,  Though 
published  in  St.  Petersburg,  it  has  a  large 
sale  in  Bessarabia. 

Both  the  Bessarcibetz  and  the  Znamya 
have  studiously  refrained  from  alluding  to 
the  indignation  excited  in  Western  Europe 
and  in  the  United  States  over  the  conse¬ 
quences  of  their  savage  appeals  to  fanatical 
mobs.  No  other  papers  being  read  in  Kish- 
ineff  by  the  anti- Jewish  section  of  the 
populace,  these  people  remain  unaffected 
by  this  outburst  of  public  reprobation  in 
other  countries.  They  are  under  the  im¬ 
pression  that  the  attack  on  the  hated  He¬ 
brews  was  a  good  work  done  for  the  Tsar, 

the  church,  and  themselves. 

331 


232 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


The  credulity  of  the  average  Russian,  in 
all  anti-Hebrew  matters,  is  boundless.  A 
Christian  lady  in  Odessa  told  me  that  her 
servant,  a  very  intelligent-looking  young 
girl,  informed  her  a  few  evenings  after  the 
horrible  events  at  Kishineff,  that  the  Jews 
of  Odessa  were  planning  the  murder  of  all 
the  Christian  children  in  the  city.  When 
the  girl  was  asked  what  information  she  had 
of  this  intended  wholesale  slaughter,  she 
replied:  I  was  told  so!  The  Jews  will 
put  poisoned  chocolate  on  Christian  door¬ 
steps  some  night,  and  then,  when  the  chil¬ 
dren  come  out  for  school  or  play  the  follow¬ 
ing  morning,  they  will  see  the  chocolate,  eat 
it,  and  die.  All  the  Jews  in  Odessa  should 
be  burned  out ! 

The  popes,  or  Russian  priests,  are  not  in 
any  special  sense  anti-Semitic.  Anyhow, 
they  wield  little,  if  any,  influence  of  that  or 
any  other  kind  upon  even  the  simple  and 
superstitious  peasantry.  The  Russian  pope 
is,  in  fact,  a  man  who  has  neither  social  nor 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES'  233 


political  importance  of  any  kind.  He  is  not 
invited  to  the  houses  of  the  nobility,  nor  is 
he  looked  up  to  or  relied  upon  by  the  people. 
He  is  a  badly  educated  Mujik,  as  a  rule, 
and  commands  neither  the  confidence  of  his 
own  class  nor  the  esteem  of  the  ruling  order. 
When  he  marries,  his  family  ties  and  do¬ 
mestic  interests  are  believed  to  be  his  chief 
considerations,  while  the  worldly  benefits 
of  his  clerical  position,  comparatively  small 
though  these  may  be,  are  believed  to  be  his 
primary  concern  in  life.  Whatever  little 
distinction  belongs  to  his  garb  and  calling 
arises  entirely  from  the  fact  that  he  is,  in 
reality,  a  clerical  soldier  of  the  Tsar ;  earn¬ 
ing  his  living  as  an  officer  of  a  religious 
army,  whose  head  and  commander-in-chief 
is  the  great  Emperor  of  all  the  Russias. 
He  is,  in  another  sense,  the  Tsar’s  moral 
policeman  among  the  Russian  people. 

The  ordinary  Russian  policeman  corre¬ 
sponds  in  many  respects  to  the  average  mem¬ 
ber  of  the  Royal  Irish  Constabulary.  He  is 


234 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


a  man  of  the  peasantry,  of  fine  physique, 
and  of  unbounded  self-importance.  He 
lacks,  however,  the  education  and  superior 
intelligence  of  his  Irish  ruraKprototype, 
while  his  reputation  is  on  a  lower  moral 
plane.  He  is  badly  officered,  as  a  rule,  and 
this  accounts  largely  for  the  suspicion 
which  attaches  to  the  performance  of  his 
duties  in  districts  where  the  numerous  vexa¬ 
tious  restrictions  in  operation  against  the 
Semitic  malady  are  so  many  tempta¬ 
tions  to  the  guardian  of  the  law  to  wink 
the  other  eye  at  evasions  of  legal  obstruc¬ 
tions  made  profitable  not  to  see.  His  pay 
is  small,  and  this,  too,  is  an  explanation  of 
his  official  dereliction  in  these  matters. 
Strenuous  efforts  have  been,  and  are  still 
being,  made  to  induce  a  more  educated  class 
of  Kussians  to  officer  the  police  force  of  the 
Empire,  but  with  slow  and  uncertain  results, 
so  far.  The  nobility  look  upon  the  army  as 
the  only  honourable  service  open  to  them, 
apart  from  diplomatic  and  administrative 
posts.  Trade  and  commerce  are,  of  course, 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  235 


infra  dig.,  and  the  police  is  even  more  so, 
from  the  point  of  view  of  all  sections  of  the 
aristocracy,  poor  and  rich,  fortunate  and 
the  reverse.  There  is  not,  strictly  speaking, 
a  Russian  middle  class,  but  there  will  soon 
be  an  intellectually  developed  class  of  men 
from  a  corresponding  social  grade  turned 
out  of  Russia’s  fine  colleges  and  gymnasi¬ 
ums,  from  whose  ranks  an  educated  body  of 
officials  will  be  recruited  for  this  and  kin¬ 
dred  public  employments.  Well  officered, 
and  better  paid  than  they  now  are,  the  Rus¬ 
sian  police  would  soon  rank  in  efficiency,  as 
well  as  in  appearance,  with  the  best  peace¬ 
preserving  forces  of  any  country. 

A  Russian  city  mob  has  little  or  no  fear 
of  the  police  force.  Nor  do  the  ordinary 
military,  as  a  rule,  inspire  rioters  with  any 
sense  of  serious  apprehensions.  The  ex¬ 
planation  is  probably  due  to  the  immediate 
kinship  of  class  and  feeling  between  the 
rough  elements  of  an  urban  community  and 
the  conscript  force  of  which  they  are  a  po- 


236 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


tential  part,  and  (in  anti-Semitic  out¬ 
breaks)  to  the  fact  that  policeman,  soldier, 
and  artisan  share  a  common  sentiment  of 
antipathy  towards  the  Jew.  It  is  emphati¬ 
cally  otherwise  with  Cossacks.  The  mob  ex¬ 
hibits  no  hesitation  when  confronted  with 
this  arm  of  the  military  power.  It  disperses 
in  double-quick  time.  I  was  told  by  one  of 
the  foreign  Consuls  in  Odessa  that  on  one 
occasion,  some  fifteen  years  ago,  there  was  a 
sudden  outbreak  of  mob  violence  which 
neither  military  nor  police  could,  or  would, 
quell.  They  attacked  the  houses  of  some 
foreign  residents,  and  the  Consul  was  called 
upon  for  protection.  He  went  at  once  to  the 
Governor,  and  suggested  the  employment 
of  a  dozen  Cossacks  to  clear  that  part  of  the 
city  of  the  disturbers.  A  troop  of  these 
splendid  horsemen  was  turned  loose  with¬ 
out  delay,  and  the  riots  were  at  an  end 
within  an  hour.  Nothing  can  stop  their 
sweeping  charge  through  a  city^s  streets. 
They  ride  over  or  through  obstacles,  human 
or  otherwise,  knout  in  hand,  and  spare  no 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  237 


one  who  has  not  already  cleared  out  of  their 
path.  As  the  Consul  remarked  to  me  when 
discussing  the  action,  and  inaction,  of  the 
military  at  Kishineff,  ^^A  dozen  Don  Cos¬ 
sacks  would  have  settled  the  whole  business 
with  the  rioters  on  Easter  Sunday  in  half 
an  hour.’^ 

During  an  attack  upon  a  Jew’s  shop  in 
Kishineff,  an  artillery  officer,  who  was 
lodging  in  a  Christian  house  opposite,  saw  a 
soldier  enter  the  premises,  and  join  in  the 
looting  of  the  unfortunate  Hebrew’s  goods. 
The  officer,  indignant  at  the  disgraceful  act 
of  the  soldier,  rushed  across  the  street,  and 
seizing  the  military  culprit,  tore  off  his 
number,  with  the  view  of  reporting  him  to 
the  Colonel  of  his  regiment.  The  mob 
turned  upon  the  officer,  who  was  compelled 
to  seek  shelter  in  his  quarters.  The  win¬ 
dows  were  smashed  with  stoned,  and  he  was 
called  upon  to  return  the  badge  containing 
the  soldier’s  number.  This  he  refused  to  do, 
and  telephoned  to  the  nearest  military  bar- 


238 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


racks  for  assistance.  He  was  ultimately 
rescued  from  the  mob^s  threatening  dis¬ 
play. 

It  was  difficult  to  obtain  any  reliable  ac¬ 
count  of  the  actual  number  of  persons  who 
were  arrested,  tried,  and  punished  for  the 
murders  and  looting  on  the  19th  and  20th  of 
April.  M.  Polak,  the  Procurator  from 
Odessa,  came  to  Kishineff  to  put  the  law  in 
motion  against  the  rioters.  About  seven 
hundred  out  of  the  fifteen  hundred  or  two 
thousand  persons  implicated  were  lodged  in 
prison.  M.  Polak  had  to  rely  upon  the  local 
authorities  to  execute  the  orders  of  the  Gov¬ 
ernment  through  him.  After  his  return  to 
Odessa  no  less  than  five  hundred  of  the 
prisoners  were  liberated,  following  an  in¬ 
quiry  before  the  Juges  d’ Instruction  which 
was  remarkable  for  the  hurried  manner  in 
which  it  was  conducted. 

Punishment  averaging  a  few  months’  im¬ 
prisonment  was  meted  out  to  about  150,  by 
the  judges  of  the  peace,  before  whom  the 


THE  KISHINEFE  MASSACRES  239 


cases  were  sent  by  the  Juges  Instruction, 
Some  fifty  were  held  on  more  serious 
charges,  but  the  results  of  their  trials  are 
not  yet  made  known.  They  will  presumably 
be  tried  before  the  Criminal  Court  of  Assize. 

None  of  the  known  local  instigators  of 
the  outbreak  were  arrested  up  to  the  date  of 
my  departure  from  Kishineff. 

Some  of  the  rioters  protested,  on  arrest, 
that  they  were  led  to  believe  that  the  local 
authorities  had  lent  their  sanction  to  the 
massacre  and  looting,  in  order  to  punish 
the  J ews  for  being  the  enemies  of  the  Tsar^s 

Government  and  the  supporters  of  Social¬ 
ism. 

The  Juge  Instruction,  M.  Davidovitch, 
who  had  to  deal  with  the  accused  in  the 
first  instance,  was  at  one  time  a  contributor 
to  the  Bessarahetz — the  active  agent  of  the 
outbreak.  I  was  informed  that  he  had  writ¬ 
ten  an  article  for  the  paper  shortly  after  the 
massacres,  showing  how  the  Jews  were 
themselves  the  sole  cause  of  the  attack  made 
upon  them  at  Easter. 


240 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


Two  especially  revolting  outrages,  the 
particulars  of  which  have  been  published, 
one,  the  killing  of  a  woman  who  was 
ceintCy  and  the  putting  of  feathers  in  her 
body  after  disembowelling  her ;  and  the  mur¬ 
der  of  a  child  two  months  old,  were  not  in¬ 
cluded  in  the  list  of  murders  which  I 
obtained,  and  I  am  not  satisfied  that  these 
two  crimes  were  actually  committed  as 
alleged.  The  J ewish  doctors  in  the  Hebrew 
Hospital  could  not  confirm  the  report  or 
particulars  of  these  two  cases.  In  the  in¬ 
stance  of  the  infant,  they  told  me  that  the 
mother,  in  defending  herself,  and  subse¬ 
quently  in  her  flight  from  the  mob,  had  let 
the  child  fall,  and  that  its  death  really  hap¬ 
pened  in  that  way. 

The  foundation  for  the  other  and  more 
inhuman  story  was,  I  think,  this:  A  Jew 
named  Kainarsky,  a  dealer  in  sheep  and 
cattle  gut,  was  attacked,  robbed,  and  mur¬ 
dered  in  a  slaughter-house.  The  mob  cut 
open  his  bowels  and  put  feathers  inside; 
prompted,  doubtless,  to  this  act  of  barbar- 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  241 


ity  by  the  nature  of  the  poor  fellow's  calling 
and  business.  It  was  an  outrage  base  and 
inhuman  enough,  in  all  conscience,  but  not 
quite  so  fiendish  in  character  as  that  of 
the  account  which  represented  a  woman 
mth  child  as  the  object  of  this  peculiar 
atrocity. 

The  man  thus  murdered  is  included  in 
the  list  of  victims  given  to  me  in  Kishineff, 
while  no  woman  is  mentioned  as  having 
undergone  such  mutilation,  a  circumstance 
which,  it  is  sincerely  to  be  hoped,  disposes 
of  the  story  as  untrue. 

Byei  Zhidofif !  "  the  terrible  cry  which 
was  the  signal  of  slaughter  at  Easter,  means 

Kill  the  Jews !  "  Zhidoff  is  a  term  of  Rus¬ 
sian  contempt  for  the  Jew. 

The  Narodovostvo,"  or  People's  Free¬ 
dom  Party,  w'hich  is  supposed  to  be  a  grow¬ 
ing  movement  in  Russia,  has  no  branch  or 
supporters  in  Kishineff,  at  least  I  failed  to 
obtain  information  of  its  existence.  It  rep- 


I 


242  WITHIN  THE  PALE 

resents  an  aspiration  rather  than  an  origi¬ 
nal  force.  A  student  who  joined  the  rioters 
on  the  first  day^s  outbreak,  with  the  object  of 
diverting  the  mob,  if  possible,  from  resort¬ 
ing  to  extreme  violence  against  the  Jews,  be¬ 
gan  by  raising  a  cry  for  constitutional 
freedom.  The  crowd  did  not  understand 
him,  whereupon  he  shouted  Down  with  the 
Government  at  St.  Petersburg !  He  was 
instantly  knocked  down,  and  would  have 
been  killed  had  the  police  not  interfered  on 
seeing  a  Kussian  in  danger.  He  was  t^en 
off  to  prison. 

Ten  days  after  the  Kishineff  massacres 
there  was  an  attempted  Socialist  demonstra¬ 
tion  at  Odessa.  It  was  in  some  way  sup- 
^  posed  to  be  a  May  Day  Labour  affair,  but 
assumed  the  form  of  an  Anarchist  turnout, 
of  which  the  police  appeared  to  have  had 
timely  intimation.  A  band  of  some  forty 
men,  workers  and  proletaires^  attempted 
to  march  toward  the  centre  of  the  city,  with 
a  red  flag  at  their  head.  After  proceeding 
along  a  small  street,  and  raising  a  few 


/ 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  243 

feeble  cries,  they  were  pounced  upon  by  the 
police  and  taken  to  prison.  It  was  found, 
on  examination,  that  nineteen  of  the  forty 
were  Jews.  They  were  all  liberated  after  a 
few  days’  detention. 

One  ground  of  objection  to  the  Zionist 
movement  for  the  repatriation  of  the  Jews 
is  that  the  Hebrews,  who  are  not  a  military 
people,  would  be  shut  off  from  European 
help  while  being  at  the  mercy  of  Turkish 
rule  and  of  Arab  hostility  in  Palestine. 
The  implied  loss  of  European  protection 
may  be  an  imaginary  risk.  The  record  of  the 
Turks  in  the  matter  of  modern  anti-Semit¬ 
ism  compares  more  than  favourably  with 
that  of  the  tender  feelings  of  European 
Christianity.  The  Arab  is  of  the  same 
racial  family  as  the  descendants  of  Father 
Abraham,  and  even  were  the  offspring  of 
Ishmael  more  numerous  in  Palestine  than 
they  are  estimated  to  be,  they  might  be 
trusted  to  show  no  more  savage  propensities 
towards  their  Israelitish  kindred  than  Rus- 


244 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


sian  Seminarists  or  Koumanian  Christians 
have  done  in  recent  years. 

Two  or  three  millions  of  Jews  in  Palestine 
would,  however,  develop  a  national  senti¬ 
ment  and  idea  that  would  soon  nourish  a 
spirit  of  patriotism  capable  of  defending 
them  from  possible  Arab  aggression. 
The  Jews  of  the  world  would  be  their 
foreign  friends  and  allies,  while  the  civilised 
nations  inhabited  by  the  scattered  Hebrews 
could  not  in  reason  neglect  to  take  a  sym¬ 
pathetic  interest  in  the  protection  and  wel¬ 
fare  of  one  of  the  oldest  peoples  in  the  world, 
restored  again  to  the  Promised  Land  of 
Israel. 

^  Russia’s  diplomatic  common  sense  should 
see  in  the  Zionist  movement  a  noble 
racial  effort,  worthy  of  assistance  on  its 
merits,  but  especially  calling  for  Russian 
help  and  encouragement.  The  creators  of 
the  Pale  of  Settlement,  and  those  responsi¬ 
ble  for  the  poverty  and  suffering  which  are 
alone  due  to  this  cause,  owe  some  reparation 
to  the  people  who  have  been  thus  treated. 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  245 

No  ten  million  pounds  which  Russia  could 
spend  on  her  army  and  navy  would  render 
her  empire  a  better  or  more  lasting  service 
than  what  would  follow  to  her  domestic 
peace  if  a  sum  of  that  amount,  or  more  if 
necessary,  were  devoted  to  the  carrying  out 
of  the  great  work  of  the  Zionist  leaders.  If 
Russia  will  only  trust  and  obey  her  better 
instincts  in  adopting  a  humane  policy  of 
this  kind,  coupled  with  a  stern  moral  war¬ 
fare  against  the  propagation  of  the  blood- 
accusation  legend  inside  the  Empire,  she 
will  cure  the  Semitic  malady,”  which  will 
otherwise  grow  to  be  an  increasing  and 
more  dangerous  evil  within  her  borders. 

The  Russian  Jew  as  an  emigrant  to  the 
United  States  is  a  subject  which  will  de¬ 
mand  serious  consideration  after  public 
interest  in  the  Kishineff  horrors  subsides. 
All  who  can  find  means  to  go  will  leave  Bes¬ 
sarabia,  unless  the  Tsar  is  inclined,  or  in¬ 
duced,  to  speak  words  which  will  be  an 
Imperial  guarantee  against  further  vi- 


246 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


olence.  No  such  words  have  yet  been 
uttered.  This  is  much  to  be  regretted  by 
all  who  believe  in  the  humanity  of  the 
Emperor's  personal  disposition.  It  tends 
to  create  the  possibly  erroneous  and  unjust 
suspicion  that  the  terror  created  by  the 
massacres  in  April  is  to  be  used  by  the 
Tsar's  advisers  pour  encourager  les 
autres/’  to  lessen  the  extent  of  the  Semitic 
malady  "  by  emigrating  from  Kussia.  But, 
in  any  case,  large  numbers  of  Jews  will  en¬ 
deavour  to  quit  the  Pale,  and  their  relatives 
and  friends  who  fled  in  1891,  and  who  have 
prospered  in  America,  may  be  counted  upon 
to  lend  assistance  to  the  new  aspirants  for 
JJnited  States  citizenship  and  protection. 

It  is  the  proletarian  Jew  and  the  mem¬ 
bers  of  the  small  huckstering  class  who  are 
the  chief  undesirables  in  Kussia  now. 
They  are  three-fourths  of  the  Semitic  popu¬ 
lation  of  the  Pale,  and  their  numbers  are 
increasing. 

I  saw  thousands  of  these  in  the  cities  and 
towns,  from  Odessa  to  Warsaw.  They  are 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  247 


not  a  drunken  nor  an  abnormally  immoral 
class.  Russian  officials  have  testified  to 
their  general  good  conduct,  on  the  whole; 
when  due  allowance  is  made  for  the  preca¬ 
rious  nature  of  their  employments  and  the 
poverty  of  their  lives.  I  observed  how 
uniform  were  the  healthy  looks  of  their 
children,  even  amidst  some  of  the  most 
wretched  surroundings.  This  is  a  good 
testimony  to  personal  character  and  civic 
qualities.  In  England  the  children  of  the 
lowest  classes  are  neglected  and  underfed 
by  parents  who  expend  in  gin  and  beer 
what  would  provide  more  nourishment  for 
their  offspring.  There  is  no  corresponding 
bad  trait  in  the  average  proletarian  Jew  of 
the  Pale. 

There  are,  as  a  matter  of  course,  traits  of 
low  cunning,  of  shady  subterfuge,  and  of 
other  obnoxious  qualities  found  among  a 
people  who  have  been  hunted  and  ground 
down  for  generations.  It  would  amount  to 
a  miracle  of  racial  morality  if  such  results 
did  not  follow  from  the  treatment  and 


248 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


6xp©ri6DC©s  of  th©  Eiissi&;D  J©w.  Tlioy  ^re 
also  suff©rers  from  the  indifferent  sanitary 
system  of  towns  like  Kishineff,  where  there 
is  an  abundance  of  water  badly  utilised  in 
municipal  management  for  the  health  and 
cleanliness  of  the  poorer  quarters  and 
suburbs  of  the  city. 


Their  poverty  and 
persecution,  along  with  the  habits  peculiar 
to  the  lowest  grade  of  Hebrew  humanity  in 
Eastern  Europe,  render  them  singularly 
objectionable  in  appearance  5  carrying  with 
them,  as  they  do,  all  the  traces  of  social 
degradation  which  cling  to  a  pariah  people 
as  a  physical  certificate  of  the  wrongs  and* 
hardships  they  have  had  to  endure. 

No  country,  be  it  ever  so  free,  hospitable, 
or  humane,  could  in  reason  be  expected  to 
open  its  ports  to  such  a  class  of  emigrant  in 
order  to  relieve  the  Russian  Government 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  249 


and  nation  of  these  wronged  and  unfor¬ 
tunate  undesirables.  They  must  first  be 
improved  in  the  land  of  their  birth  by  more 
liberty  and  better  treatment,  or  be  sent  for 
change — for  better  conditions  of  industrial 
life  and  hopes — ^to  Palestine,  where  land 
labour  could  be  provided  for  them.  Trans¬ 
plantation  would  be  an  effective  remedy,  if 
carried  out  under  careful  supervision.  The 
root  qualities  of  the  Jew — his  intelligence, 
his  faith,  his  intense  ambition  to  possess 
money — would,  under  a  more  favourable  en¬ 
vironment,  reclaim  him  from  the  induced 
vices  which  have  naturally  grown  out  of  the 
congenial  surroundings  of  poverty,  suffer¬ 
ing,  and  injustice.  The  human  being  who 
can  succeed  in  living  at  all  the  semblance  of 
a  civilised  existence,  under  the  depressing 
conditions  obtaining  for  the  Jew  within  the 
towns  of  the  Pale,  could  not  fail  in  winning 
a  better  livelihood  where  rural  industries 
and  petit  culture,  such  as  the  soil  and  situa¬ 
tion  of  Palestine  will  encourage,  would  be 
open  to  his  intelligence,  ambition,  and 


250 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


energies.  Such  a  Jew  has  no  hope  in 
Russia.  He  could  not  possibly  meet  a 
worse  fate  in  Palestine.  No  other  country 
can  be  expected  to  give  him  the  privilege  of 
its  citizenship.  Therefore,  if  he  is  not  to  be 
improved  off  the  face  of  the  earth  by  a  cor¬ 
roding  poverty,  or  by  periodical  outbreaks 
like  that  of  Kishineff,  he  should  be  taken 
by  the  Zionist  movement  to  where  there  are 
both  the  promise  and  inspiration  of  a  new 
life. 

The  Polish  proletarian  Jew  has  more 
virility  than  the  Hebrew  of  the  same  class 
within  the  Pale.  He  is  no  more  prepossess- 
ipg  in  appearance,  while  it  is  not  wronging 
him  to  say  that  he  is  less  desirable,  in  some 
other  respects,  as  a  citizen  of  another  coun¬ 
try.  The  Jews  are  sufficiently  numerous  in 
Poland  to  enlist  the  co-operation  of  So¬ 
cialist  revolutionary  forces  there,  and 
thereby  to  obtain,  by  some  means,  a  right  to 
live.  They  are  not  so  powerless  as  those 
within  the  Pale,  and  Russia  may  soon  find 
it  a  wise  and  necessary  policy  to  allow  them 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  251 


to  have  a  freer  access  than  they  now  enjoy 
to  the  resources  of  the  country,  in  order  to 
lessen  their  growing  numbers  in  the  ancient 
capital  of  the  Kingdom  of  Poland.  There 
are  over  a  quarter  of  a  million  of  them  in 
Warsaw.  They  would  be  a  dangerous  ele¬ 
ment  there  if  driven  to  extremities,  or  in  the 
event  of  any  complications  arising  between 
the  Russian  Empire  and  Germany.  In  any 
case,  the  Polish  Jew  will  work  out  his  own 
destiny.  He  has  lived  in  Poland  for  over 
seven  hundred  years,  and  this  long  experi¬ 
ence  of  varied  forms  of  fortune  and  of  op¬ 
pression  gives  him  a  tenure  and  a  hope 
which  may  yet  win  him  back  some  of  the 
rights  and  privileges  he  once  enjoyed  before 
he  lost  the  tolerant  protection  of  the  Polish 
people  in  becoming  the  agent  and  tool  of 
the  Polish  landed  aristocracy. 

Since  the  foregoing  parts  of  this  book 
were  prepared  for  the  press,  it  has  been 
announced  from  Russia  that  Vice-Governor 
Ostrogoff  has  been  transferred  from  Kishi- 


252 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


neff  to  Stavropol,  in  the  Caucasus.  This 
action  marks  the  severe  condemnation  of 
this  officiaFs  conduct  by  the  Russian  Gov¬ 
ernment. 

The  head  of  the  gendarmerie  at  Kishineff 
has  been-retired  from  service. 

It  has  also  been  reported  from  apparently 
reliable  sources  that  several  persons  who 
were  at  first  accused  of  participation  in  the 
massacres,  and  liberated  after  a  short  de¬ 
tention  in  prison,  have  been  re-arrested,  and 
will  be  tried  in  September.  It  is  further 
stated  that  there  are  to  be  53  indictments  for 
manslaughter  in  addition  to  34  prisoners 
^ready  held  for  trial,  while  400  other  cases 
are  under  investigation. 

It  has  likewise  been  published  in  the  press 
that  former  Governor  Von  Raaben  had 
asked  for,  and  had  been  denied,  an  interview 
with  the  Emperor. 

According  to  reports  circulated  from 
Vienna  on  the  10th  of  July,  the  special  visit 
paid  to  Kishineff  by  the  Minister  of  Justice 
was  responsible  for  the  action  of  the  authori- 


THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  253 


ties  in  re-arresting  suspected  culprits,  and 
for  the  intention  to  prosecute  several  of  the 
prominent  instigators  of  the  riots  at  Easter 
who  had  been  arrested  or  accused  for  their 
connection  with  the  massacres  up  to  the 
date  of  the  author’s  departure  from 
Kishineff. 

From  a  similar  Vienna  source,  it  has  been 
reported  that  one  of  these  prominent  anti- 
Semites  of  Kishineff  had  committed  suicide, 
as  a  result  of  an  inquiry  instituted  into  his 
conduct  during  the  disturbances. 

The  actual  murderers  of  the  Christian 
Ribalenko  of  Doubossar,  who  was  de¬ 
clared  by  the  Bessarahetz  neTvspaper  to 
have  been  killed  by  the  Jews  for  sacrificial 
purposes,  have  been  discovered  and  arrested. 
He  was  killed  by  one  Tischtchevko,  the 
caretaker  of  the  orchard  in  which  the  body 
was  found.  The  murderer  confesses  that 
the  uncle  of  the  boy  took  part  in  committing 
the  crime.  -  Both  the  murderers  are  Rus¬ 
sians  and  Christians. 

The  latest  published  report  of  the  Kishi- 


254 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


neff  Relief  Cammittee  gives  the  following 
account  of  the  moneys  received  and  how 
expended  by  that  body : 

To  the  end  of  June  735,476  roubles  have 
been  received  as  follows : 


RECEIPTS 


Roubles 

America, . 

192,443 

England, . 

16,001 

Germany . 

35,675 

Italy  ,•••••• 

5,000 

Holland, . 

1,000 

Austria, 

10,415 

Roumania, . 

3,023 

France . 

9,248 

Russia,  .  .  .  .  . 

462,671 

Total, . 

735,476 

EXPENDITURES 

Roubles 

Provisions . 

14,700 

To  sufferers  (directly),  . 

273,622 

T0‘ sufferers  (indirectly), 

30,000 

To  35  families  of  those  murdered  or  who 

died  of  wounds, 

87,500 

To  two  families  of  invalids,  . 

4,600 

To  the  Ladies’  Committee,  for  preparing 

linen  and  clothes  and  for  a  creche. 

4,000 

To  settling  50  families  in  Palestine, 

50,000 

Total, . 

464,422 

Balance  in  hand,  .... 

271,054 

Roubles,  .... 

• 

735,476 

THE  KISHINEFF  MASSACRES  255 


The  number  of  families  who  suffered 
from  the  riots  is  given  at  about  2750.  Ap¬ 
plications  for  relief  were  received  from 
2538  families,  to  the  amount  of  2,332,890 
roubles.  The  number  of  persons  murdered, 
or  who  died  of  wounds,  is  put  down  at  47 ; 
severely  wounded,  92 ;  slightly  wounded, 
345.  Some  of  the  latter  were  treated  by 
private  doctors.  The  killed  left  behind  35 
widows  and  123  orphans.  The  number  of 
persons  rendered  unfit  for  work  has  not  yet 
been  ascertained,  but  is  so  far  given  as  50. 
The  Committee  is  of  opinion  that  in  order 
to  satisfy  all  the  losses  for  which  only  now 
claims  are  being  made  200,000  roubles  will 
still  be  required.’^ 


APPENDICES 
Appj:ndix  I 

PRESIDENT  ROOSEVELT  AND  THE  JEWS 
{From  the  Daily  Press) 

Washington,  June  15.— Through  their 
representative  association,  B’nai  B’rith,  the 
Jews  of  America  to-day  laid  their  case  be¬ 
fore  President  Roiosevelt  and  Secretary 
Hay,  and  they  are  content  to  abide  by  what¬ 
ever  the  Executive  decides  is  best  for  them. 

A  statement  of  the  proceedings  given  out 
at  the  White  House  concerning  the  confer¬ 
ence  consisted  of  a  memorandum  submitted 
by  the  B^nai  B^rith  on  the  recent  Kishineff 
massacre,  a  tentative  draft  of  a  petition  to 
the  Tsar,  which  it  is  desired  this  Gov¬ 
ernment  should  unofficially  or  semi-offi- 
cially  assist  in  delivering  to  the  Tsar,  and 

procuring  a  reply  thereto,  and  copies  of  the 

256 


APPENDICES 


257 


replies  of  Secretary  Hay  and  President 
Roosevelt  to  their  callers. 

The  memorandum  says  that  the  facts  con¬ 
cerning  the  Kishineff  massacre  as  officially 
reported  by  the  Russian  Government  have 
appalled  and  horrified  not  only  the  Jews  in 
Russia  and  elsewhere,  but  the  whole  Ameri¬ 
can  people,  who  want  something  done,  and 
whose  hostility  to  Russia,  if  nothing  is  done, 
will  become  intensified  and  fixed. 

In  his  reply  to  the  memorandum  Secre¬ 
tary  of  State  John  Hay  said : 

“No  person  of  ordinary  humanity  can 
have  heard  without  deep  emotion  the  story 
of  the  cruel  outrages  infiicted  upon  the  Jews 
of  Kishineff.  These  lamentable  events  have 
caused  the  profoundest  impression  through¬ 
out  the  world,  but  most  especially  in  this 
country,  where  there  are  se  many  of  your 
coreligionists  who  form  such  a  desirable 
element  of  our  population  in  industry, 
thrift,  public  spirit,  and  commercial  mo¬ 
rality. 

Nobody  can  ever  make  the  Americans 


258 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


think  ill  of  the  Jews  as  a  class  or  as  a  race 
— we  know  them  too  well.  In  the  painful 
crisis  through  which  we  are  now  passing 
the  Jews  of  the  United  States  have  given 
evidence  of  the  highest  qualities — generos¬ 
ity,  love  of  justice,  and  power  of  self¬ 
restraining. 

The  Government  of  the  United  States 
must  exhibit  the  same  qualities.  I  know 
you  do  not  doubt  the  sentiments  of  the  Pres¬ 
ident.  No  one  hates  more  energetically  than 
he  does  such  acts  of  cruelty  and  injustice  a^ 
those  we  deplore.  But  he  must  carefully 
consider  all  the  circumstances  and  then  de¬ 
cide  whether  any  official  action  can  be  taken 
in  addition  to  the  impressive  and  most 
effective  expressions  of  public  opinion  in 
this  country  during  the  last  month.  You 
will  have  observed  that  no  civilised  govern¬ 
ment  in  the  world  has  yet  taken  official 
action — this  consideration  alone  would  bid 
us  to  proceed  with  care. 

The  Emperor  of  Russia  is  entitled  to  our 
respect,  not  merely  as  the  ruler  of  a  great 


APPENDICES 


259 


,  ^ 

and  friendly  nation,  but  as  a  man  whose 

personal  character  is  even  more  elevated 
than  his  exalted  station.  We  should  not  be 
justified  in  assuming  that  this  enlightened 
sovereign,  who  has  given  so  many  proofs  of 
his  devotion  to  peace  and  religious  toler¬ 
ance,  has  not  done  and  is  not  doing  all  that 
lies  in  his  power  to  put  a  stop  to  these  atroc¬ 
ities,  to  punish  the  guilty,  whether  they 
belong  to  the  ignorant  populace  or  to  high 
official  circles,  and  to  prevent  the  occur¬ 
rence  of  the  outrages  which  have  so  shocked 
humanity.  In  fact,  all  we  know  of  the  state 
of  things  in  Eussia  tends  to  justify  the  hope 
that  even  out  of  the  present  terrible  situa¬ 
tion  some  good  results  may  come;  that  He 
who  watches  over  Israel  does  not  slumber, 
and  that  the  wrath  of  man,  now  as  so  often 
in  the  past,  shall  be  made  to  praise  Him.’^ 
The  call  on  the  President  at  the  White 
House  followed,  and  there  President  Roose¬ 
velt,  after  the  memorandum  was  laid  before 
him,  said : 

Mr.  Chairman :  I  ne^d  not  dwell  upon  a 


/ 


260 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


fact  so  patent  as  the  widespread  indignation 
with  which  the  American  people  heard  of 
the  dreadful  outrages  upon  the  Jews  in 
Kishineff.  I  have  never  in  my  experience 
in  this  country  known  of  a  more  immediate 
or  a  deeper  expression  of  the  sympathy  for 
the  victims  and  of  horror  over  the  appalling 
calamity  that  has  occurred. 

It  is  natural  that  while  the  whole  civi¬ 
lised  world  should  express  such  a  feeling,  it 
should  yet  be  most  intense  and  widespread 
in  the  United  States;  for  of  all  the  great 
powers  I  think  I  may  say  that  the  United 
States  is  that  Country  in  which,  from  the  be¬ 
ginning  of  its  national  career,  most  has  been 
done  in  the  way  of  acknowledging  the  debt 
due  to  the  Jewish  race,  and  of  endeavouring 
to  do  justice  to  those  American  citizens 
who  are  of  Jewish  ancestry  and  faith. 

One  of  the  most  touching  poems  of  our 
own  great  poet,  Longfellow,  is  that  on  the 
Jewish  cemetery  in  Newport,  and  anyone 
who  goes  through  any  of  the  old  cemeteries 
of  the  cities  which  preserve  the  records  of 


APPENDICES 


261 


colonial  times  will  see  the  name  of  many  an 
American  of  Jewish  race  who,  in  war  or  in 
peace,  did  his  full  share  in  the  founding  of 
this  nation.  From  that  day  to  this,  from  the 
day  when  the  Jews  of  Charleston,  of  Phila¬ 
delphia,  of  New  York,  supported  the  patriot 
cause  and  helped  in  every  way,  not  only  by 
money,  but  by*  arms,  Washington  and  his 
colleagues,  who  were  founding  this  Kepub- 
lic — from  that  day  to  the  present  we  have 
had  no  struggle,  military  or  civil,  in  which 
there  have  not  been  citizens  of  Jewish  faith 
who  played  an  eminent  part  for  the  honour 
and  credit  of  the  nation. 

I  remember  once  General  Howard  men¬ 
tioning  to  me  the  fact  that  two  of  his  bri¬ 
gade  commanders  upon  whom  he  had  placed 
speeial  reliance  were  Jews.  Among  the 
meetings  of  the  Grand  Army  which  I  have 
attended  one  stands  out  with  peculiar  vivid¬ 
ness — a  meeting  held  under  the  auspices  of 
the  men  of  the  Grand  Army  of  Jewish  creed 
in  the  temple  in  Forty-fourth  Street^ — Tem¬ 
ple  Emanu-El — to  welcome  the  returned 


262 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


veterans  of  the  Spanish-American  war  of 
J ewish  faith. 

When  in  Santiago,  when  I  was  myself  in 
the  army,  one  of  the  best  colonels  among  the 
regular  regiments  who  did  so  well  on  that 
day,  and  who  fought  beside  me,  was  a  Jew. 
One  of  the  commanders  of  the  ships  which, 
in  the  blockade  of  the  Cubaa  coast,  did  so 
well,  was  a  Jew. 

In  my  own  regiment  I  promoted  five 
men  from  the  ranks  for  valour  and  good 
conduct  in  battle.  It  happened  by  pure  acci¬ 
dent,  for  I  kn^w  nothing  of  the  faith  of  any 
one  of  them,  that  these  included  two  Prot- 
estantB,  two  Catholics,  and  one  Jew;  and 
while  that  was  a  pure  accident,  it  was  not 
without  its  value  as  an  illustration  of  the 
ethnic  and  religious  make-up  of  our  nation 
and  of  the  fact  that  if  a  man  is  a  good  Amer¬ 
ican,  that  is  all  we  ask,  without  thinking  of 
his  creed  or  his  birthplace. 

In  the  same  way,  when  I  was  Police 
Commissioner  in  New  York,  I  had  experi¬ 
ence  after  experience  of  the  excellent  service 


APPENDICES 


263 


done — an  excellent  work  needing  nerve  and 
hardihood,  excellent  work  of  what  I  may 
call  the  Maccabee  type  in  the  Police  Depart¬ 
ment  under  me,  by  police  officers  of  Jewish 
extraction. 

Let  me  give  you  one  little  incident  with 
a  direct  bearing  upon  this  question  of  perse¬ 
cution  for  race  or  religious  reasons.  You 
may  possibly  recall,  I  am  sure  certain  of  my 
New  York  friends  will  recall,  that  during 
the  time  I  was  Police  Commissioner  a  man 
came  from  abroad — I  am  sorry  to  say,  a 
clergyman — to  start  an  anti- Jewish  agita¬ 
tion  in  New  York,  and  announced  his  inten¬ 
tion  of  holding  meetings  to  assail  the  Jews. 
The  matter  was  brought  to  my  attention. 

Of  course,  I  had  no  power  to  prevent 
those  meetings.  After  a  good  deal  of  thought 
I  detailed  a  Jewish  sergeant  and  forty  Jew¬ 
ish  policemen  to  protect  the  agitator  while 
he  held  his  meetings;  so  he  made  his 
speeches  denouncing  the  Jews  protected  ex¬ 
clusively  by  Jews,  which  I  always  thought 
was  probably  the  most  effective  answer 


264 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


that  could  possibly  be  made  to  him,  and 
probably  the  best  object  lesson  that  we  could 
give  of  the  spirit  in  which  we  Americans 
manage  such  matters. 

“  Now  let  me  give  you  another  little 
example  dealing  with  a  Kussian  Jew,  an 
experience  I  had  while  handling  the  Police 
Department,  and  that  could  have  occurred, 
I  think,  nowhere  else  than  in  the  United 
States. 

There  was  a  certain  man  I  appointed 
under  the  following  conditions:  I  was  at¬ 
tracted  to  him  by  being  told  on  a  visit  to  the 
Bowery  branch  of  the  Young  Men’s  Chris¬ 
tian  Association  that  they  had  a  young  fel¬ 
low  there,  a  Jew,  who  had  performed  a  feat 
of  great  note  in  saving  people  from  a  burn¬ 
ing  building,  and  that  they  thought  he  was 
just  the  type  for  a  policeman.  I  had  him 
called  up  and  told  him  to  take  the  examina¬ 
tion,  and  see  if  he  could  get  through.  He 
did,  and  he  passed. 

He  has  only  been  an  excellent  police¬ 
man,  but  he  at  once,  out  of  his  salary,  pro- 


APPENDICES 


265 


ceeded  to  educate  his  younger  brothers  and 
sisters,  and  he  got  either  two  or  three  of  his 
old  kinsfolk  over  from  Russia.,  through  the 
money  he  had  saved,  and  provided  homes 
for  them. 

I  have  given  you  examples  of  men  who 
have  served  under  me  in  my  administration 
of  the  Police  Department  in  New  York  and 
my  regiment.  In  addition  thereto,  some  of 
my  nearest  social  friends,  some  of  those 
with  whom  I  have  been  closest  in  political 
life,  have  been  men  of  Jewish  faith  and  ex¬ 
traction.  Therefore,  inevitably,  I  have  felt  a 
degree  of  personal  sympathy  and  personal 
horror  over  this  dreadful  tragedy,  as  great 
as  can  exist  in  the  minds  of  any  of  you  gen¬ 
tlemen  yourselves. 

Exactly  as  I  should  claim  the  same  sym¬ 
pathy  from  any  one  of  you  for  any  tragedy 
happening  to  any  Christian  people,  so  I 
should  hold  myself  unworthy  of  my  present 
position  if  I  failed  to  feel  just  as  deep  sym¬ 
pathy  and  just  as  deep  sorrow  and  just  as 
deep  horror  over  an  outrage  like  this  done 


266 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


to  the  Jewish  people  in  any  part  of  the 
earth. 

I  am  confident  that  much  good  has  al¬ 
ready  been  done  by  the  manifestations 
throughout  the  country,  without  any  regard 
to  creed  whatsoever,  of  horror  and  sympathy 
over  what  has  occurred.  It  is  gratifying  to 
know — what  we  would,  of  course,  assume — 
that  the  Government  of  Sussia  shows  the 
feelings  of  horror  and  indignation  with 
which  the  American  people  look  upon  the 
outrages  at  Kishinelf,  and  is  moving  vigor¬ 
ously  not  only  to  prevent  their  continuance, 
but  to  punish  the  perpetrators. 

That  government  takes  the  same  view  of 
those  outrages  that  our  own  government 
takes  of  the  riots  and  lynchings  which  some¬ 
times  occur  in  our  country,  but  do  not  char¬ 
acterise  either  our  government  or  our 
people. 

I  have  been  visited  by  the  Eussian  Am¬ 
bassador  on  his  own  initiative,  and  in  addi¬ 
tion  to  what  has  been  said  to  Secretary  Hay, 
the  Russian  Ambassador  has  notified  me 


APPENDICES 


267 


personally,  without  any  inquiry  upon  my 
part,  that  the  Governor  of  Kishineft  has 
been  removed;  that  between  three  hundred 
and  four  hundred  of  the  participants  in  the 
outrages  have  been  arrested,  and  he  volun¬ 
tarily  stated  that  those  men  would  be  pun¬ 
ished  to  the  utmost  that  the  law  would 
permit. 

I  will  consider  most  carefully  the  sug¬ 
gestions  that  you  have  submitted  to  me  and 
whether  the  now-existing  conditions  are 
such  that  any  further  official  expression 
would  be  of  advantage  to  the  unfortunate 
survivors,  with  whom  we  sympathise  so 
deeply.  Nothing  that  has  occurred  recently 
has  had  my  more  constant  thought,  and 
nothing  will  have  my  more  constant 
thought,  than  this  subject.  In  any  proper 
way  by  which  beneficial  action  may  be  taken 
it  will  be  taken,  to  show  the  sincerity  of  the 
historic  American  position  of  treating  each 
man  on  his  merits  as  a  man,  without  the 
least  reference  to  his  creed,  his  race,  or  his 
birthplace.^’ 


268 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


Appendix  II 

A  LETTER  FROM  LEO  TOLSTOY 

The  following  is  the  translation  of  a  let¬ 
ter  from  Count  Leo  Tolstoy  to  a,  Jew  who 
had  asked  his  opinion  concerning  the  out¬ 
rages  in  Kishineff: 

I  have  received  your  letter.  I  had  al¬ 
ready  received  several  similar  letters.  All 
the  writers  request  me,  as  you  do,  to 
express  my^  opinion  on  the  events  at 
Kishineff.  It  seems  to  me  that  these  ap¬ 
peals  are  based  on  a  misunderstanding. 
My  correspondents  supposed  that  my 
words  carried  weight,  and  I  am  there¬ 
fore  begged  to  express  my  opinion  on 
an  event  so  important  and  so  complicated  in 
its  origins  as  the  crime  committed  at  Kish¬ 
ineff.  The  misunderstanding  consists  in 
demanding  from  me  the  work  of  a  publicist, 
whereas  I  occupy  myself  exclusively  with  a 
single  definite  question,  having  nothing  in 


APPENDICES 


269 


common  with  contemporary  events  —  viz., 
the  question  of  religion  and  its  application 
to  life.  To  request  from  me  the  public  ex¬ 
pression  of  my  opinion  on  contemporary 
events  is  as  illogical  as  it  would  be  to 
demand  such  expression  from  any  other 
specialist  who  makes  use  of  contemporary 
events  to  illustrate  his  views.  I  cannot,  like 
a  publicist,  even  if  I  thought  it  would  be 
useful,  express  my  opinions  on  everything 

that  occurs,  no  matter  how  important  it 

\ 

may  be.  If  I  did  so  I  should  have  to  speak 
hurriedly  and  without  reflection,  repeating 
what  has  been  said  by  others,  and  then  my 
opinions  would  cease  to  have  the  importance 
for  the  sake  of  which  their  expression  is 
sought. 

As  regards  my  views  on  the  Jews  and  on 
the  horrible  doings  at  Kishineff,  they  ought, 
it  would  seem,  to  be  clear  to  all  who  would 
interest  themselves  in  my  conception  of  life. 
I  cannot  regard  the  Jews  other  than  as 
brothers  whom  I  love,  not  because  they  are 
Jews,  but  because,  like  ourselves  and  every- 


270 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


body  else,  they  are  sons  of  the  one  God  the 
Father.  Such  love  needs  no  effort  on  my 
part,  for  I  have  met  and  known  many  excel¬ 
lent  people  among  the  Jews.  My  attitude 
towards  the  Kishineff*  outrage  is  likewise 
defined  by  my  religion  and  my  conception  of 
life.  When  I  read  the  first  accounts  in  the 
newspapers,  even  before  I  knew  of  the  hor¬ 
rible  details  which  afterwards  came  to  light, 
I  realised  the  full  horror  of  what  had  oc¬ 
curred  and  was  filled  with  a  profound  pity 
for  the  innocent  victims  of  the  barbarity  of 
the  mob,  mingled  with  astonishment  at  the 
bestial  ferocities  of  these  pretended  Chris¬ 
tians  and  disgust  and  loathing  towards  the 
so-called  educated  people  who  stirred  up  the 
mob  and  sympathised  with  its  doings.  But 
what  I  felt  most  deeply  was  horror  at  the 
criminals  who  were  really  responsible  for 
all  that  had  occurred,  horror  at  our  Govern¬ 
ment,  with  their  clergy,  who  keep  the  people 
in  a  state  of  ignorance  and  fanaticism,  and 
with  their  bandit  horde  of  officials.  The  out¬ 
rages  at  Kishineff  are  but  the  direct  result 


APPENDICES 


271 


of  the  propaganda  of  falsehood  and  violence 
which  our  Government  conducts  with  such 
energy.  The  attitude  of  our  Government 
towards  these  events  is  only  one  more  proof 
of  the  brutal  egoism  which  does  not  flinch 
from  any  measures,  however  cruel,  when  it 
is  a  question  of  suppressing  a  movement 
which  is  deemed  dangerous,  and  of  their 
complete  indifference  (similar  to  the  indif¬ 
ference  of  the  Turkish  Government  towards 
the  Armenian  atrocities)  towards  the  most 
terrible  outrages  which  do  not  affect 
Government  interests. 

This  is  all  I  can  say  with  regard  to  the 
events  at  Kishineff,  but  it  has  all  been  said 
long  ago  by  me.  If  you  ask  me  what,  in  my 
opinion,  the  J ews  ought  to  do,  my  answer  in 
that  case,  as  in  others,  is  the  logical  out¬ 
come  of  that  Christian  teaching  which  I 
strive  to  understand  and  to  follow.  For  the 
Jews,  as  for  all  men,  one  thing,  and  one 
thing  only,  is  necessary  for  salvation;  to 
follow  as  closely  as  may  be  the  universal 
rule,  ‘Do  unto  others  as  you  would  that 


272 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


others  should  do  unto  you.’  They  should 
fight  the  Government  not  by  violence — 
that  weapon  should  be  left  to  the  Govern¬ 
ment^ — but  by  virtuous  living  to  the  exclu¬ 
sion  not  only  of  all  violence  towards  their 
neighbours,  but  of  all  participation  in  vio¬ 
lence,  even  when  called  upon  by  the  Govern¬ 
ment  instruments  of  violence  for  their  own 
advantage.  This  is  all  I  can  say  with  regard 
to  the  horrible  events  at  Kishineff ;  all  this 
is  very  old  and  is  well  known.” 


Appendix  III 

'Maxime  Gorky,  the  Eussian  novelist, 
wrote  the  following  letter  to  the  Kishineff 
Kelief  Committee: 

“  Russia  has  been  disgraced  more  and 
more  frequently  of  recent  years  by  dark 
deeds,  but  the  most  disgraceful  of  all  is  the 
horrible  Jewish  massacre  at  Kishineff, 
which  has  awakened  our  horror,  shame,  and 
indignation.  People  who  regard  themselves 


APPENDICES 


273 


as  Christians,  who  claim  to  believe  in  God^s 
mercy  and  sympathy,  these  people,  on  the 
day  consecrated  to  the  resurrection  of  their 
God  from  the  dead,  occupy  the  time  in  mur¬ 
dering  children  and  aged  people,  ravishing 
women,  and  martyring  the  men  of  the  race 
that  gave  them  Christ. 

‘^Who  bears  the  blame  of  this  base 
crime,  which  will  remain  on  us  like  a  bloody 
blot  for  ages?  We  shall  be  unable  to  wash 
this  blot  from  the  sad  history  of  our  dark 
country.  It  would  be  unjust  and  too  simple 
to  condemn  the  mob.  The  latter  was  merely 
the  hand  which  was  guided  by  a  corrupt 
conscience,  driving  it  to  murder  and  rob¬ 
bery.  For  it  is  well  known  that  the  mob  at 
Kishineff  was  led  by  men  of  cultured  soci¬ 
ety.  But  cultivated  society  in  Russia  is 
really  much  worse  than  the  people,  who  are 
goaded  by  their  sad  life  and  blinded  and 
enthralled  by  the  artificial  darkness  created 
around  them. 

The  cultivated  classes  are  a  crowd  of 
cowardly  slaves,  without  feeling  of  personal 


274 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


dignity,  ready  to  accept  every  lie  to  save 
their  ease  and  comfort;  a  weak  and  lawless 
element  almost  without  conscience  and 
without  shame,  in  spite  of  its  elegant  exte¬ 
rior.  Cultivated  society  is  not  less  guilty  of 
the  disgraceful  and  horrible  deeds  commit¬ 
ted  at  Kishineff  than  the  actual  murderers 
and  ravishers.  Its  members’  guilt  consists 
in  the  fact  that  not  merely  did  they  not  pro¬ 
tect  the  victims,  but  that  they  rejoiced  over 
the  murders;  it  consists  chiefly  in  commit¬ 
ting  themselves  for  long  years  to  be  cor¬ 
rupted  by  man-haters  and  persons  who  have 
long  enjoyed  the  disgusting  glory  of  being 
the  lackeys  of  power  and  the  glorifiers  of 
lies,  like  the  editor  of  Bessarab etz  of  Kishi¬ 
neff  and  other  publicists.  These  are  the  real 
authors  of  the  disgraceful  and  awful  crime 
of  Kishineff.  To  all  the  shameful  names 
hitherto  given  to  these  repulsive  men  must 
be  added  another,  and  the  well-deserved  one, 
of  ‘  instigators  of  pillage  and  murder.’ 
These  hypocrites,  with  the  name  of  God  on 
their  lips,  who  preach  in  Kussian  society 


APPENDICES 


275 


hatred  of  the  Jews,  Armenians,  and  Finns, 
to-day  heap  base  and  cowardly  calumnies 
upon  the  corpses  of  those  killed  through 
their  influence,  and  they  shamelessly  con¬ 
tinue  their  hateful  work  of  poisoning  the 
mind  and  feeling  of  the  weak-willed  Rus¬ 
sian  society. 

Shame  upon  their  wicked  heads !  May 
the  fire  of  conscience  consume  their  decayed 
hearts,  covetous  only  of  lackey-like  honours 
and  slavishly  obsequious  to  power ! 

It  is  now  the  duty  of  Russian  society 
that  is  not  yet  wholly  ruined  by  these  ban¬ 
dits,  to  prove  that  it  is  not  identified  with 
these  instigators  of  pillage  and  murder. 
Russian  society  must  clear  its  conscience  of 
part  of  the  shame  and  disgrace  by  helping 
the  orphaned  and  desolated  Jews  and  assist¬ 
ing  these  members  of  the  race  which  has 
given  to  the  world  many  really  great  men 
and  which  still  continues  to  produce  teach¬ 
ers  of  truth  and  beauty  in  spite  of  its  op¬ 
pressed  condition  in  the  world. 

Come,  therefore,  all  who  do  not  want 


276 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


themselves  to  be  regarded  as  the  lackeys  of 
the  lackeys,  and  who  still  retain  their  self- 
respect ;  come  and  help  the  J ews ! 

Appendix  IV 

FATHER  JOHN  OF  KRONSTADT  RECANTS 

A  Reuter^s  telegram  from  St.  Petersburg 
dated  the  13th  of  June,  stated: 

The  famous  Orthodox  priest,  Father 
John  of  Kronstadt,  whose  fiery  condemna¬ 
tion  of  the  Kishineff  massacre  was  pub¬ 
lished  in  a  Liberal  newspaper  of  St.  Peters¬ 
burg,  has  published  the  following  statement 
in  the  anti-Semitic  journal  Znamya,  the  new 
St.  Petersburg  organ  of  M.  Kroushevan,  for¬ 
merly  editor  of  the  Bessarahet^ : 

To  my  beloved  brethren  of  Christ  in 
Kishineff:  From  the  newspaper  accounts 
that  followed  those  first  published  about  the 
Kishinefi  catastrophe,  I  have  come  to  the 
ponclusion  that  the  Jews  themselves  were 


APPENDICES 


277 


the  cause  of  those  disorders  and  the  wounds 
inflicted  and  the  murders  committed  on 
April  6  and  7  [old  style].  I  have  arrived  at 
the  conclusion  that  it  is  the  Christians  who 
have  suffered  in  the  end,  and  that  the  Jews 
have  been  doubly  repaid  for  their  losses  and 
injuries  by  their  own  brethren  and  others. 
I  know  this  from  letters  which  I  have  re¬ 
ceived  from  my  people,  who  have  lived  for  a 
long  time  in  Kishineff  who  are  well  ac¬ 
quainted  with  the  state  of  things  there,  and 
who  are  most  trustworthy.  Therefore  I 
say  to  Kishineff  Christians,  forgive  the  re¬ 
proach  which  I  cast  upon  you  alone  on 
account  of  the  horrors  perpetrated.  From 
letters  of  eye-witnesses  I  am  convinced  that 
one  cannot  lay  all  the  blame  upon  the  Chris¬ 
tians,  who  were  incited  to  the  disorders  by 
the  Jews,  and  that  the  latter  are  mainly 
responsible  for  the  catastrophe.^’ 

No  Russian  newspaper  of  any  influence, 
with  the  exception  of  the  NovQy^-Vremyaj 
has  attempted  to  palliate  the  massacre,  or 
to  lay  the  blame  for  it  on  the  Jews. 


278 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


Appendix  V 

Simon  of  Trent,  from  an  article  of  Dr. 
Bloch  in  the  OesterreicMsche  Wochen- 
schrift,  No.  42,  October  the  20th,  1899. 
(Freely  translated.) 

SIMON  OF  TRENT 

The  case  of  the  alleged  ritual  murder 
of  the  child  Simon  of  Trent  is  the  most  im¬ 
portant  example  of  its  kind,  and  is  there¬ 
fore  frequently  quoted  by  anti-Semites.  I 
have  given  the  history  of  the  case  in 
the  OesterreicMsche  Wochenschrift.  The 
Vienna  Vaterland  of  the  17th  October, 
and  Pastor  Deckert  in  the  Deutsches 
Vollcshlatt  discuss  my  articles,  but  care¬ 
fully  avoid  mentioning  the  OesterreicM 
ische  Wochenschrift,  In  May,  1893,  the 
Vienna  Vaterland  was  obliged  to  pub- 
lish  several  a^rticles  from  my  j>en,  contra¬ 
dicting  the  statements  made  by  Pastor 


APPENDICES 


279 


Deckert..  In  an  article  of  May  the  30th, 
1893,  I  called  attention  to  a  fact  which 
throws  a  glaring  light  upon  the  history  of 
the  caise :  Some  days  before  the  murder  of 
the  child,  during  the  Easter  week  of  1475, 
Bernardinus  de  Feltre,  whilst  preaching  in 
Trent  against  the  Jews,  expressed  himself 
to  the  following  effect:  ^^And  with 
these  cursed  Jews  you  are  on  a  friendly 
footing?  You  say,  although  without  the 
true  faith,  they  are  good  people?  But  I  tell 
you  that  even  before  the  Easter  will  have 
come  to  an  end  they  will  have  given  you  a 
proof  of  their  kindness.  (Of.  Wadding, 
''Annales  Minorum,''XIV.  p.  132).  Bernar¬ 
dinus  thus  predicted  the  murder  days  before 
it  happened.  His  prophecy  was  naturally 
fulfilled..  On  Thursday  in  Passion  Week, 
March  the  23d,  Simon,  the  28-months’-old 
son  of  the  tanner  Andreas,  disappeared. 
Bernardinus  accused  the  Jews,  and  on  Sat¬ 
urday  the  body  of  a  child  was  discovered  in 
the  house  of  Sumuel.  The  Jews  themselves 
informed  the  Bishop  Hinderbach,  in  conse- 


280 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


quence  of  which  information  all  of  them, 
including  women  and  children,  were  im¬ 
prisoned. 

In  his  article  of  the  17th  of  October,  Pas¬ 
tor  Deckert  maintains  that:  It  is  not  true 
that  the  confessions  made  by  the  J ews  were 
obtained  by  means  of  torture,  and  that  they 
had  been  tortured  whilst  there  were  abso¬ 
lutely  no  indications  of  their  guilt.’’  Pastor 
Deckert  is  right.  There  were  proofs  against 
them,  proofs  of  a  very  extra-ordinary  na¬ 
ture.  As  soon  as  the  bishop  saw  the  body 
of  the  child  he  exclaimed :  This  is  the  work 
of  the  Jews!  ”  (Acta  Sane.,  II.,  March  24,  p. 
497),  and  swore  to  have  revenge.  He  en¬ 
trusted  the  prefect  of  the  town,  Johann  de 
Salis,  with  the  conduct  of  the  action.  The 
latter  put  the  richest  Jews  to  (an  ordeal?) 
trial,  and  the  wounds  having  begun  to  bleed 
as  soon  as  the  Jews  approached  the  body, 
which  is  always  the  case,  as  experience 
teaches  ( expert entia  compertum  est),  when 
a  murderer  approaches  his  victim,  this  fact 
was  a  convincing  proof  of  the  guilt  of  the 


APPENDICES 


281 


Jews.  There  was  also  another  proof  ” 
against  the  Jews.  In  the  prison  of  Trent 
a  converted  Jewish  criminal,  Johann  de 
Feltre,  was  detained.  By  accusing  his  for¬ 
mer  coreligionists  he  could  hope  for  free¬ 
dom  ;  and  he  became  a  witness,  ready  to  say 
anything  and  everything  against  the  Jews. 
Pastor  Deckert  maintains  that  it  is  not 
true  that  the  confessions  of  the  Jews 
were  obtained  in  consequence  of  tortures 
only.” 

I  have  refuted  his  statement  with  his  own 
words.  On  p.  21  of  his  article  he  himself 
states :  only  torture  could  make  them  con¬ 
fess;  without  tortures  they  ivould  have  con¬ 
fessed  nothing/’  The  Jews  were  submitted 
for  several  days  to  the  most  inhuman  tor¬ 
tures,  and  only  then  confessed.  This  is 
proved  by  the  contents  of  the  letters  of  the 
Bishop  addressed  to  the  Pope :  The  accused 
Jews  have  been  tortured  for  several  days 
(per  pluries  dies  torti  et  interrogati),  but 
have  confessed  nothing  ”  •  and  in  another 
place  the  Bishop  writes :  Although  much 


282 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


has  been  done  against  the  Jews,  a  fortnight 
has  passed  without  any  result/’ 

Had  the  prisoners  confessed  at  the  first, 
second,  or  third  application,  the  official 
would  not  have  employed  so  many  varia- 
tions  of  torture.  All  the  alleged  confessions 
had  therefore  been  obtained  by  means  of 
terror  and  tortures  of  the  most  cruel  char¬ 
acter. 

The  sufferings  of  the  martyrs  are  related 
in  the  letters  of  the  Bishop  addressed  to  the 
Pope : 

On  the  30th  day  of  March  (Vienna  Acts, 
fol.  51 )  Samuel  was  ^  examined  ’  for  the 
first  time;  he  was,  however,  sent  back  to 
prison  to  ‘recover’  (animum  repetendi), 
which  term  means  in  judicial  language  that 
he  had  fainted.  On  the  following  day 
(March  31st)  he  was  undressed,  and  with 
his  feet  and  hands  tied,  hoisted  up  on  a  rope 
and  kept  suspended  in  the  air,  his  limbs 
being  thus  turned  out  of  their  joints.  As, 
however,  he  still  persisted  in  maintaining 
his  innocence,  he  received  ‘  una  cavaletta  ’ 


APPENDICES 


283 


(a  leap),  in  other  words,  he  was  quickly 
lowered  and  pulled  up  again ;  then  the  cord 
on  which  he  was  suspended  was  ^  touched,^ 
i.  e.y  beaten,  and  he  was  made  to  ^  leap  ’  sev¬ 
eral  times.  The  victim  having  swooned,  the 
torture  ceased.  It  was  continued,  with 
several  variations  of  exquisite  cruelty,  on 
the  3d  of  April. 

On  the  4th  day  (April  the  7th)  the  pro¬ 
cedure  was  resumed;  and  as  the  victim  ex¬ 
claimed  :  If  I  were  to  confess  my  guilt,  I 
would  only  be  telling  a  lie,^’  a  wooden  peg 
was  attached  to  his  leg,  ivhilst  he  remained 
suspended  in  the  air,  thus  considerably 
augmenting  the  pain.  Then  a  pan  filled 
with  fire  and  brimstone  was  held  to  his  nose. 

He  still  maintained  his  innocence,  until 
at  last,  mad  with  pain  and  suffering,  he 
confessed  that  he  and  Tobias  had  strangled 
the  boy.  This  admission,  clearly  contra¬ 
dicting  the  blood  accusation,  was  all  that 
could  be  obtained  from  him.  Samuel  was 
kept  imprisoned  for  two  months  (up  to 
June  the  7th)  whilst  the  other  Jews  were 


284 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


being  examined.”  Evidently  Samuel 
must  have  retracted  his  confession  of  the 
8th  of  April,  as  the  following  excerpt  from 
the  Acts  will  show : 

Wednesday,  June  the  7th,  in  the  torture 

chamber. 

Invited  to  speak  the  truth  and  informed 
that  all  his  companions  had  confessed  their 
guilt,  he  replied  that  if  they  had  done  so 
they  had  told  a  lie.  The  prefect  of  the  town 
having  been  informed  that  the  drinking  of 
holy  water  made  criminals  confess  their 
guilt,  Samuel  was  made  to  drink  a  spoonful 
of  consecrated  water. 

He  persisted,  however,  in  maintaining  his 
innocence.  Then  two  hot  boiled  eggs  were 
put  under  his  shoulder-blades.  Asked  to 
speak  the  truth,  he  promised  to  do  so,  but 
in  presence  of  the  prefect  and  the  captain 
of  the  town  only.  Left  alone  with  these 
two  gentlemen,  he  asked  them  to  promise 
him,  that  he  would  only  (!)  be  burnt  and 
not  have  to  die  any  other  death.”  That  is 
the  manner  in  which  he  was  made  to  confess 


APPENDICES 


285 


his  guilt.  In  spite  of  his  mad  self-accusa¬ 
tions  he  was  asked  again  to  tell  the  truth 
better  still  ( Interrogatus,  quod  melius 
dicat  veritatem,  minante  eidam  Samueli, 
quod  si  non  dicat  veritatem,  ponetur  ad 
cordam.  Qui  Samuel  respondit,  quod  vult 
dicere  veritatem,  quia  ex  quo  confessus  est 
mortem  pueri,  vult  confiteri  aliqua),  and 
was  threatened  with  new  tortures.  On  the 
21st  of  June  he  was  burnt  alive.  .  All  the 
other  victims  were  treated  in  the  same  man¬ 
ner,  even  those  who  had  accepted  baptism. 

Israel,  son  of  Mohar  of  Brandenburg,  was 
arrested  on  the  27th  of  March,  tortured 
from  the  12th  to  the  21st  of  April,  and  hav¬ 
ing  expressed  the  wish  to  be  baptised  was 
freed.  On  the  26th  of  October,  however,  he 
was  again  arrested,  tortured  several  times, 

and  killed  on  the  wheel  on  the  19th  of  Janu- 

* 

ary.  This  sentence  was  due  to  the  fact  of 
his  having  given  evidence  before  the  Papal 
Legate,  the  Bishop  of  Ventimiglia  at  Eo- 
veredo,  relating  to  the  “  examination  ”  of 
the  accused.  In  No.  128  of  the  Vienna 


286 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


Vaterland  (May  the  10th,  1893)  I  proved 
that  the  Duke  and  the  Council  of  Venice 
sent  two  eminent  jurisconsults  ’’  from 
Padua  to  Trent  to  investigate  the  manner 
in  which  the  accused  were  examined.  The 
learned  doctors  were  maltreated  by  the  mob. 
An  Apostolic  note  issued  by  Pope  Sixtus 
IV.,  on  the  10th  of  October,  1475,  prohibits, 
under  punishment  of  excommunication,  the 
claim  that  the  child  Simon  of  Trent  was  a 
martyr.  It  is  not  proved,  says  the  note  ’’ 
that  the  child  Simon  had  been  murdered  by 
the  Jews  (nihil  adhuc  certum  compertumve 
nostro  judicio  aut  approbatum  de  quodam 
puero  Simone  Tridentino  per  Judseos,  ut 
dicitur,  interfecto).  The  Pope  appointed 
the  Legate,  Bishop  of  Ventimiglia,  Giovanni 
dei  Giudici,  to  investigate  the  case.  The  in¬ 
vestigation  took  place  at  Roveredo,  in  1476, 
and  the  innocence  of  the  Jews  was  proved. 
An  Zelinus,  a  citizen  of  Trent,  proved 
that  a  certain  Swiss,  Zanesus,  living  in 
Trent,  and  an  enemy  of  the  Jews,  was  the 
actual  murderer  of  the  child.  That  the 


APPENDICES 


^287 


Papal  Legate  had  clearly  established  the 
innocence  of  the  Jews  is  manifest  by  the 
acts  of  the  case,  dated :  October  the  20th  and 
29th,  and  November  2d,  1475,  and  April 
3d,  1476. 

It  was  natural,  therefore,  that  with  re¬ 
gard  to  this  case  Pope  Paul  III.,  in  a  Bull  of 
May  the  12th,  1540,  declared  the  blood  ac¬ 
cusations  to  be  nothing  but  the  result  of 
hatred  and  envy,  and  of  covetousness  due  to 
a  desire  to  seize  and  appropriate  the  posses¬ 
sions  of  the  Jews.  The  Bull  further  pro¬ 
hibits,  under  the  severest  punishment  of  the 
Church,  the  revival  of  such  accusations  in 
the  future. 

INTERPELLATION  ADDRESSED  BY  DR.  BYK,  DR. 

RAPPOPORT,  AND  COLLEAGUES  TO  HIS  EXCEL¬ 
LENCY,  THE  MINISTER  OF  JUSTICE,  VIENNA. 

The  false  and  terrible  accusation  that  the 
Jews  require  blood  of  Christians  for  their 
religious  rites  and  ceremonies  has  been 
systematically  disseminated,  for  the  last  few 


288 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


months,  all  over  Austria.  The  immediate 
cause  of  the  movement  was  the  Polna  case 
of  the  murder  of  Agnes  Hruza.  A  Jew  has 
been  accused  of  the  crime,  but  although  his 
guilt  has  not  yet  been  proved,  the  circum¬ 
stance  has  been  used  by  a  prejudiced  party, 
hostile  to  the  Jews,  and  ritual  murder  sug¬ 
gested.  At  the  trial  the  public  prosecutor, 
representing  the  government,  public  mo¬ 
rality,  and  the  law,  placed  himself  under  the 
influence  of  that  accusation  by  the  use  of 
the  words,  the  well-known  motives  of  the 
crime.’’  The  president  of  the  court  found 
no  words  of  protest  against  the  blood 
legend,  which  was  made  use  of,  in  presence 
of  an  excited  crowd,  for  party  purposes. 
Although  there  was  no  ground  and  no  cor¬ 
roboration  for  the  accusation,  the  belief 
gained  popularity,  thanks  to  the  attitude  of 
these  organs  of  justice.  That  the  unre¬ 
strained  spread  of  such  a  terrible  ac¬ 
cusation  must  bring  about  disastrous 
consequences,  is  self-evident.  No  law  and 
no  power  are  strong  enough  to  protect  those 


■ 


APPENDICES 


289 


who  require  the  blood  of  innocent  human 
victims  for  their  religious  rites.  The  whole 
extent  of  the  danger  was  perceived  cen¬ 
turies  ago,  and  Popes  and  temporal 
(non-religious)  rulers,  especially  kings  of 
Poland,  stro:igly  prohibited  the  raising  and 
spread  of  the  false  accusation.  This  was 
done  by  the  Popes:  Innocent  IV.  (in  the 
Bulls  of  May  the  28th,  1247 ;  J uly  the 
5th,  1247;  and  September  the  22d,  1258) ; 
Gregory  X.  (October  the  7th,  1272) ;  Mar¬ 
tin  Y.  (February  the  20th,  1422) ;  Michael 
V.  (November  the  5th,  1447) ;  Paul  III. 
(May  the  12th,  1540) ;  who,  availing  them¬ 
selves  of  their  fullest  authority,  most  em¬ 
phatically,  and  under  pain  of  the  severest 
punishment  of  the  Church,  forbade  the 
Christians  to  raise  blood  accusations 
against  the  Jews.  The  example  of  the 
Popes  was  followed  by  the  kings  of  Poland : 
Jan  Albrecht  in  his  edict  of  1496;  Zygmunt 

1.,  1514;  Zygmunt  II.,  August,  1548; 
Stephen  Batory,  1576  and  1580;  Zygmunt 

111.,  1592 ;  Wladystan  IV.,  1663 ;  Jan  Ka- 


290 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


zimir,  1694;  Midiael  I.,  1696;  August  II., 
1763;  August  III.,  1763,  and  Stanislaus  Au¬ 
gust,  1765;  commanded  eternal  silence 
(seternum  silentium)  in  regard  to  the 
calumny  of  the  blood  accusation,  under  the 
penalty  of  “  poena  talionis.”  In  Bohemia, 
where  the  case  of  Huelsner  occurred,  the 
Kings  Ottokar  II.  (March  29th,  1254;  and 
August  23d,  1268) ;  Wenzel  II.  (1300) ;  and 
Ladislav  IV.  (May  the  15th,  1454),  issued 
similar  decrees.  In  other  countries  special 
laws,  relating  to  the  blood  accusation,  have 
been  enacted.  The  condition  of  the  present 
Austrian  legislation  makes  the  promulga¬ 
tion  of  special  laws  unnecessary.  Un¬ 
fortunately,  however,  the  law  is  powerless 
against  the  extravagant  excesses  of  the 
press ;  and  thus  daily,  in  various  languages, 
the  legend  of  the  ritual  murder  is  spread 
among  all  classes  of  society. 

In  the  face  of  the  above  facts,  we  beg  to 
submit  the  following  questions : 

(a)  Is  your  Excellency  aware  of  the 
existing  evil? 


APPENDICES 


291 


(b)  What  measures  does  your  Excel¬ 
lency  propose  to  take,  with  a  view  to  put 
an  end  to  it? 

Dr.  Byk,  Dr.  Rappoport,  Piepes-Poratyn- 
ski.  Dr.  Rosenstock,  Dr.  Trachtenberg,  Dr. 
Kolischer,  Yaworski,  Bilinski,  Dziednsz- 
ycki,  Gorski,  David  Abrahamovicz,  Die- 
lemba,  Struszkiewicz,  Gizowski,  Moysa, 
Wladimir  Gniewosz,  Bogdanowicz,  Pientak, 
Milewski,  Dr.  Walewski,Ratowski,  Lewicki, 
Roszkowski,  Henzel,  Popowski,  Weigel, 
Kareis,  Auspitz,  Straucher,  Tittinger, 
Sokolowski. 

POPE  INNOCENT  IV.  (5th  July,  1247). 

To  the  Archhishops  and  Bishops  of  Ger¬ 
many. 

We  havfe  received  a  pitiable  complaint 
from  the  Jews  of  Germany.  They  say  that 
some  nobles,  lay  and  ecclesiastical,  and 
other  powerful  and  notable  men  within  your 
cities  and  dioceses,  designing  to  seize  and 
usurp  their  goods  unjustly,  devise  against 


292 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


them  impious  counsels  and  invent  diverse 
pretexts.  Without  considering  that  testi¬ 
monies  to  the  Christian  Faith  have  pro¬ 
ceeded  from  their  records  and  that  the 
Sacred  Scripture  among  other  precepts  oi 
the  Law  says:  Thou  shalt  not  kill/^  and 
forbids  them  at  their  Passover  ceremonies 
to  touch  any  dead  flesh,  they  falsely  accuse 
the  Jews  of  using  in  these  same  ceremonies 
the  body  of  a  murdered  child,  thinking  that 
the  said  practice  is  required  by  their  Law, 
whereas  it  is  clearly  contrary  to  their  Law. 
And  they  cast  upon  the  Jews,  with  malicious 
intent,  any  corpse  that  by  chance  is  dis¬ 
covered  at  any  place.  Attacking  them  with 
these  and  other  inventions,  and  without 
formal  accusation,  confession  or  conviction, 
and  in  despite  of  the  privileges  conceded  to 
the  Jews  by  the  clemency  of  the  Holy  See, 
they  despoil  them  of  their  goods  (contrary 
to  the  law  of  God  and  to  justice),  and  they 
visit  them  with  hunger,  imprisonment,  and 
so  many  calamities  and  afflictions,  punish¬ 
ing  them  with  diverse  punishments  (even 


APPENDICES 


293 


condemning  many  of  them  to  shameful 
death)  that  the  Jews,  living  under  the  rule 
of  the  said  princes,  notables,  and  powerful 
men  in  worse  plight  than  were  their  fathers 
under  Pharaoh  in  Egypt,  are  compelled  to 
leave  places  where  they  and  their  ancestors 
have  dwelt  from  time  immemorial.  Hence, 
in  fear  of  extermination,  they  have  thought 
it  necessary  to  have  recourse  to  the  protec¬ 
tion  of  the  Holy  See.  Now,  therefore,  being 
unwilling  that  the  Jews  should  be  unjustly 
harassed  (for  God  in  his  mercy  awaits  their 
conversion,  seeing  that,  on  the  testimony  of 
the  Prophet,  it  is  believed  that  the  remnant 
of  them  is  destined  to  be  saved),  we  order 
that  you  show  yourselves  favourable  and 
well  disposed  to  them,  and  whenever  you 
find  any  violent  attempt  made  against  them, 
with  respect  to  the  matters  mentioned 
above,  by  the  prelates,  nobles,  and  powerful 
men  aforesaid,  you  shall  see  that  the  matter 
is  treated  according  to  law,  and  shall  not  in 
future  permit  the  Jews  to  be  improperly 
molested  on  these  or  similar  charges  by  any 


294 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


persons  whatever.  Those  who  molest  them 
you  shall  summarily  restrain  by  your  ec¬ 
clesiastical  censure. 

POPE  INNOCENT  IV.  (1247). 

To  the  Archbishop  of  Vienna, 

Divine  justice  has  not  cast  down  the  Jew¬ 
ish  people  without  preserving  the  remnant 
of  them  for  salvation.  Therefore,  it  is  an 
act  of  zeal  that  deserves  no  commendation, 
or  of  cruelty  that  is  worthy  of  detestation, 
when  Christians,  either  through  greed  for 
wealth  or  thirst  for  blood  (disregarding  the 
merciful  nature  of  the  Christian  Church, 
which  allows  the  Jews  to  live  in  its  midst 
and  to  practise  their  own  rites),  plunder, 
torture,  and  slay  them  without  trial.  Now, 
the  Jews  living  within  your  province  have 
lately  brought  before  the  Holy  See  a  pitiable 
complaint.  They  say  that  certain  prelates 
and  nobles  of  the  province,  desirous  of  hav¬ 
ing  a  pretext  for  cruelty  towards  them,  have 
accused  them  of  the  death  of  a  girl  who  is 


APPENDICES 


295 


said  to  have  been  found  secretly  murdered 
near  Valr^as,  that  they  have  inhumanly 
committed  some  of  them  to  the  flames  with¬ 
out  legal  trial  or  confession,  while  they  have 
despoiled  others  of  all  their  possessions  and 
driven  them  away,  and  that, — against  the 
wont  of  the  Mother  who,  herself  free,  brings 
forth  children  that  they  may  be  children  of 
freedom — they  have  compelled  their  chil¬ 
dren  to  be  baptised  against  their  will. 
Now,  since  we  are  unwilling  to  tolerate  such 
things^ — ^^as,  indeed,  we  could  not  do  without 
transgressing  the  will  of  God — we  hereby 
command  you  to  deal  according  to  law  with 
such  attacks  on  the  Jews,  of  the  nature  that 
has  been  described  above,  as  are  made  by 
bishops,  nobles,  and  rulers.  You  shall  not 
permit  the  Jews  to  be  unjustly  ill-treated  on 
these  or  similar  grounds,  and  you  shall 
restrain  the  evil-doers  by  the  summary  use 
of  ecclesiastical  censures. 


296 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


POPE  INNOCENT  IV.  (25th  September,  1253). 

Moreover,  in  order  to  counteract  the 
wickedness  and  greed  of  evil  men,  we  decree 
that  no  one  shall  harm,  or  trespass  on,  the 
cemeteries  of  the  J ews,  or  shall  dig  up  dead 
bodies  to  obtain  money,  or  shall  charge 
them  with  using  human  blood  in  their  cere¬ 
monies.  Though  they  are  ordered  in  the 
Old  Testament  to  use  no  blood  at  all— not 
to  mention  human  blood— yet  many  Jews 
have  been  killed  at  Fulda  and  in  many  other 
places  on  suspicion  of  having  used  human 
blood.  By  the  authority  of  these  presents 
we  strictly  forbid  such  actions  in  the  future. 
If  any  man,  having  become  acquainted  with 
the  purport  of  this  decree,  contravenes  it — 
we  pray  that  such  a  thing  may  not  happen — 
let  him  be  exposed  to  the  danger  of  losing 
his  office  or  rank,  or  let  him  be  punished  by 
excommunication,  unless  he  makes  suitable 
amends  for  his  presumption;  but  we  wish 
this  protection  of  ours  to  be  given  only  to 


APPENDICES 


297 


those  who  use  no  devices  for  the  subversion 
of  the  Christian  faith. 


POPE  GBEGOET  X.  (Tth  October,  1272)’. 

Since  J ews  cannot  bear  testimony  against 
Christians,  we  decree  that  the  testimony  of 
Christians  against  Jews  shall  be  of  no  avail 
unless  there  is  a  Jew  bearing  testimony 
among  them.  For  it  sometimes  happens 
that  Christians  lose  their  children,  and 
Jews  are  charged  by  their  enemies  with  tak¬ 
ing  them  away  and  killing  them  and  using 
their  hearts  and  blood  for  religious  pur¬ 
poses  ;  the  fathers  of  the  children,  or  other 
Christians,  in  hatred  of  the  Jews,  hide  the 
ay ,  so  that  they  may  cause 
trouble  to  the  Jews  and  gain  money  from 
them  for  relieving  them  from  their  trouble, 
and  in  order  that  they  may  most  falsely 
assert  that  the  Jews  have  secretly  stolen 
and  murdered  the  children  and  that 
they  use  the  blood  for  religious  purposes, 
whereas  their  law  strictly  forbids  them  to 


298 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


use  blood  for  ceremonial  purposes,  or  to 
taste  it,  or  to  eat  the  flesh  of  animals  with 
cloven  hoofs,  as  has  been  many  times  dem¬ 
onstrated  at  our  court  by  Jews  converted 
to  the  Christian  faith.  On  charges  of  this 
kind  Jews  have  often  been  seized  and  im¬ 
prisoned  unjustly.  We  decree  that  in  such 
cases  the  testimony  of  Christians  against 
Jews  shall  not  be  admitted;  that  Jews  im¬ 
prisoned  on  this  empty  charge  shall  be 
liberated;  that  they  be  not  imprisoned  in 
future  oUv-this  empty  charge  unless  (which 
we  cannot  believe)  they  are  found  in  the 
act. 

(Signed  by  the  Pope,  four  cardinals,  and 
two  bishops). 

POPE  MARTIN  V.  (20th  February,  1422). 


It  sometimes  happens  that  many  Chris¬ 
tians,  in  order  that  they  may  extort  money 
from  the  said  Jews  and  deprive  them  of 
their  goods  and  substance  and  cause  them 
to  be  killed,  invent  pretexts  and  assert  (at 


_ _ APPENDICES  299 

times  of  plague  and  other  calamities)  that 
the  Jews  have  poisoned  the  wells  and  mixed 
human  blood  with  their  unleavened  bread : 
they  say  that  it  is  in  consequence  of  these 
crimes,  which  they  unjustly  ascribe  to  the 
Jews,  that  the  calamities  are  caused. 
Hence  the  population  is  moved  against  the 
Jews  and  massacres  them  and  persecutes 
and  afflicts  them  in  many  ways. 

POPE  NICHOLAS  V.  (1447). 

Some  persons  have  ventured  to  make  the 
untruthful  assertion  that  the  Jews  are 
unable  to  celebrate  certain  of  their  festivals 
without  using  the  liver  or  heart  of  a  Chris¬ 
tian. 

POPE  PAUL  HI.  (12th  May,  1550)  . 

To  the  Clergy  of  Hungary,  Bohemia,  and 
Poland. 

We  have  heard  with  displeasure,  through 
the  complaints  of  the  Jews  in  your  parts, 


300 


WITHIN  THE  PALE 


that  various  .  .  .  towns,  nobles,  and  power¬ 
ful  men  among  you,  being  jealous  of 
the  Jews  and  hostile  to  them,  and  blinded 
by  hatred  and  envy,  or,  as  is  more  probable, 
by  greed,  and  wishing  to  have  a  pretext  for 
depriving  them  of  their  goods,  falsely 
charge  them  with  slaying  your  children  and 
drinking  their  blood,  and  committing  many 
other  horrible  crimes  specially  directed 
against  our  faith.  Thus  they  attempt  to 
arouse  the  feelings  of  simple  Christians 
against  the  Jews,  and  it  often  results  that 
the  Jews  ^  are  not  only  robbed  of  their 
property,  but  are  even  murdered. 


THE  END 


c4  SMPTABLE  ’BIOGRAPHY 


RECOLLECTIONS 

PERSONAL  AND  LITERARY 
BY 

RICHARD  HENRY  STODDARD 

(edited  by  RIPLEY  HITCHCOCK) 

With  a  preface  by 
EDMUND  CLARENCE  STEDMAN 

Illustrated.  i2mo.,  cloth,  Price,  $1.50  net. 

LaTge  Paper  Edition^  litniied  to  200  copies^  extra 
illustrated.  Printed  on  Japan  paper,  uncut, 
price  $7  50  net,  '  ' 

j^^R.  STODDARD  was  the  last  survivor 
of  the  time  which  has  been  called  the 
Golden  Age  of  American  Letters.  His 
meetings  with  Edgar  Allan  Poe,  and  their 
curious  ending,  his  visits  to  Hawthorne,  and 
Hawthorne’s  kindly  counsel,  his  talks  with 
Thackeray,  his  literary  discussions  before 
Lowell  s  study  fire,  Boker’s  frank  comments 
upon  the  contemporary  theatre,  his  golden 
nights  with  Bayard  Taylor  are  among  the 
pictures  which  are  presented  in  these  per¬ 
sonal  and  fascinating  RECOLLECTIONS. 
The  writer’s  dry  humor  and  quaint  origin¬ 
ality  of  expression  ‘impart  an  added  charm 
to  the  most  notable  literary  autobiogranhv 
of  recent  years. 


TENNESSEE  TODD 

A  Dramatic  Story  of  Steamboat  Life  on  the  Mississippi 

BY 

G.  W.  OGDEN 

i2ino.  with  frontispiece,  cloth,  Price,  $1.50 

^’OT  since  the  time  when  Mark  Twain 
immortalized  the  Mississippi  in  Tom 
Sawyer  and  Huckleberry  Finn,  has  anyone 
come  forward  to  tempt  comparison  with 
those  inimitable  portraits.  But  at  last,  a 
man  who  knows  the  life  of  the  river  and 
who  has  catight  the  spirit  of  it,  has  revived 
the  old  steamboat  days  during  the  years 
when  the  first  railroad  between  St.  Louis 
snd  New  Orleans  was  wresting  supremacy 
from  the  river. 

Tennessee  Todd  is  the  story  of  that 
fight  between  the  steamboat  and  the  rail¬ 
road,  between  the  old  order  and  the  new, 
between  the  men  who  had  carried  on  war¬ 
fare  with  the  treacherous  stream  until  they 
had  become  its  controllers,  and  the  new 
men  which  the  inevitable  advance  of  com¬ 
merce  brought  with  capital  and  brains  to 
usurp  the  power  and  break  the  pride  of  the 
men  of  the  Mississippi. 


c4  GREAT  FIRST*  cHPVEL 


The  Circle  in  the  Square 

The  Story  of  a  New  Battle  on  Old  Fields 

BY 

BALDWIN  SEARS 

i2mo.  cloth,  Price  $1.50 

NOVEL  of  extraordinary  power,  deal¬ 
ing  with  the  absorbing  social  and 
political  questions  of  the  South  which  con¬ 
front  America  to-day  no  less  than  they  con¬ 
fronted  the  government  before  and  immedi¬ 
ately  after  the  Civil  War,  in  a  different, 
though  equally  threatening,  form. 

With  sympathy,  humor  and  strength,  the 
life  and  problems  of  to-day  in  one  section 
of  the  South — which  may  be  taken  as  rep¬ 
resentative  of  many  communities  all  over 
the  South  is  presented  in  a  broader  way 
than  has  been  done  in  any  American  novel. 
As  the  work  of  an  entirely  new  author,  it 
will  attract  immediate  attention  for  its  re¬ 
markable  literary  quality  and  its  compre¬ 
hensive  grasp  of  a  broad  social  and  political 
motive. 


cA  S70RY  OF  THE  LAKES 


HIS  LITTLE  WORLD 

THE  STORY  OF  HUNCH  BADEAU 

BY 

SAMUEL  MERWIN 

Author  of  “  The  Road  to  Prontenac,”  joint- 
author  of  “  Calumet  K”  etc. 

12  mo.  cloth.  Illustrated.  $1.25 

'JpHIS  is  the  story  of  a  man.  Whether 
driving  his  schooner  through  a  lake 
storm,  or  quelling  a  lumber-yard  mutiny, 
or  sacrificing  his  love  for  the  sake  of  a 
friend.  Hunch  Badeau  is  every  inch  a  man. 

He  doesn  t  preach,  but  unconsciously, 
and  prompted  simply  by  the  bigness  of  his 
heart,  he  exemplifies  a  nobility  which  does 
the  reader  good.  Many  things  happen  in 
this  story.  Readers  will  like  and  they  will 
remember  Hunch  Badeau. 


